Main Cast: Clark Gable, Lana Turner, Anne Baxter, John Hodiak, Ray Collins
Release Year: 1948
Country: US
Run Time: 113 minutes
Plot
When Homecoming was first released in 1948, some observers felt that Clark Gable's unusually sensitive performance was based on his own memories of losing his wife Carole Lombard in a 1942 plane crash. Intriguingly, Gable's Homecoming co-star is Lana Turner, with whom it was rumored that he was having an affair at the time of Lombard's death. Told in flashback, the story concerns the romance of war-time army surgeon Ulysses Delby Johnson (Gable) and Red Cross nurse Lt. Jane "Snapshot" McCall (Turner). Though married, Johnson cannot help to be drawn to Jane as they slog through the hellish battlegrounds of Italy and France. As the war draws to a close, Johnson is faced with a dilemma: how can he find happiness with Jane without bringing misery to his beloved wife Penny (Anne Baxter). As it turns out, Fate intervenes to solve Johnson's problem. Though well-acted and directed, Homecoming is just too thin to be spread out over 12 reels. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Although Homecoming was a big box office hit in its day, it's actually a fairly dull film. As is so often the case, the blame rests primarily on the material, in this case the treacly soap opera concocted by Paul Osborn and Jan Lustig from the Sidney Kingsley story. Homecoming makes claims to being a sensitive drama about the issues confronting men returning from war, but it uses that setting for sheer, unadulterated melodrama, and doesn't sacrifice any occasion to bring out tired cliché after tired cliché from the soap opera handbook. Director Mervyn LeRoy doesn't try to battle the soapiness of the material, which is probably just as well, but opts instead to play it for all its worth, never missing an opportunity to highlight his handsome leading man and gorgeous leading lady in the most flattering way possible. (He doesn't do too shabbily by second leads Anne Baxter and John Hodiak either.) But it's Clark Gable and Lana Turner that drive this movie, pushing it with all their considerable movie star skill and turning in a couple of pretty fine performances. It doesn't make Homecoming good, but it certainly makes it a heck of a lot more palatable. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
Randall Duell - Art Director, Cedric Gibbons - Art Director, Helen Rose - Costume Designer, Mervyn LeRoy - Director, John D. Dunning - Editor, Bronislau Kaper - Composer (Music Score), Charles Previn - Musical Direction/Supervision, Jack Dawn - Makeup, Harold Hal Rosson - Cinematographer, Sidney Franklin - Producer, Henry W. Grace - Set Designer, Edwin B. Willis - Set Designer, Arnold A. Gillespie - Special Effects, Warren Newcombe - Special Effects, Jan Lustig - Screenwriter, Paul Osborn - Screenwriter, Sidney Kingsley - Short Story Author
