I Found Stella Parish

Kay Francis is at the height of her screen career and in the title role of I Found Stella Parrish. She's a celebrated actress over in the United Kingdom who right after opening in a play to rave reviews suddenly vanishes.

Reporter Ian Hunter goes on the trail. Her producer Paul Lukas has billed her as a'woman of mystery so there's no real background. But with that voice, she's an American. Ian crosses the pond and on the same ship.

It's the usual story he falls for her, but the story comes first. After that it's who does she get in the end?

Also in the picture is a menacing Barton MacLane who is the source of her troubles. They had some history back in the day that Hunter painstakingly digs out. He's only on briefly, but he is scary.

Francis has some good scenes with her daughter Sybil Jason who's origins remain discreet as per The Code.

Francis runs a whole gamut of emotions in this film. One of her best performances.

Stella Parish (Kay Francis) is a famous stage star in England. Her private life is private. As she reaches new heights, a mystery man from her past threatens it all. She escapes to America with her daughter Gloria and close personal friend Nana (Jessie Ralph). Eager reporter Keith Lockridge (Ian Hunter) smells a story and follows them.

I really like the mystery man with him not showing his face. I would like for the mystery figure to show up once in awhile. In comparison, Keith is less compelling. The exposition is a bit too long, but she does have to tell the whole story. I would have liked this story more as a mystery thriller and less as a melodrama.

This is a badly dated melodrama about an actress whose dark past is revealed by a conniving reporter. Kay Francis is luminous, but she can't play trash.

When Stella gets tough and starts on her downward trend, Kay, with her patrician beauty and educated accent, can't do it. A very talky movie, supposedly set in England, but the atmosphere and language aren't very British.

Apparently the play she appears in has something to do with Caligula - trust me, it's no starmaking play or performance. It was fun to see that the play actually had an orchestra, a reminder of the old days when "straight plays" were really huge events.

A potboiling soap opera with Kay Francis decked out in all the most exaggerated finery of the day.

Emotions abound throughout as logic and reason are cast to the wind. This is what they were aiming toward and what the audience wanted. They expected Kay Francis to suffer and emote and play on the heartstrings of some innocent man.

Her actions in this film are so illogical that they can only be seen as the conveyance to situations where Francis can suffer and emote even more.

They pulled it off fairly well.

that drags in places. But Kay Francis is always worth watching. She plays an actress with a surprising past that catches up with her. Ian Hunter, Paul Lukas, and Jessie Ralph are all ok, but Sybil Jason is yukky as the kid. The play that Kay is a smash in a a total dog, but it hardly matters. Film could also have shown her burlesque tour in a seedier light. But this Warners programmer kills 84 minutes pleasantly.