Moderately sane people don't go to the movies to learn anything, least of all in history. Therefore, if a show is good entertainment, it is little short of pedantry to inquire into its authenticity. "The Gorgeous Hussy" may be the acme of historical precision, or it may be almost pure fiction. The latter possibility is, of course, the more likely. But 90% of the audience, including the Crimson Moviegoer, don't care, and 99%, again including said reviewer, don't know.

The show as it stands is very high second rate amusement. In this hour when political frenzy has only just ceased to run rampant, the turbulent election of Andrew, Jackson comes as a welcome reminiscence. Even more acceptable, however, to us thin-blooded moderns for whom the only racy element in politics is verbal abuse, is the sight of a presidential candidate coming down from his parlor to exchange black eyes with the maligner of his backwoods wife, or, when president, firing his whole cabinet because they and their wives whisper unkind things about his favorite Peggy O'Neal. The career of this strong-minded young man is this essence of the picture: her service as inn-keeper's daughter rendered to Andrew Jackson and his Rachel, and to the brilliant states rights squabblers, Danial Webster and John Randolph of Virginia; her brief marriage to an excessively gay sailor; her having to spurn the adored John Randolph because he subscribes to the wrong view, her serving Andrew Jackson as the wife of his nondescript Secretary of War, and her implication in scandal as the result of her midnight dash to the deathbed of the aforesaid Mr. Randolph.

Joan Crawford is most happily cast. Her familiar vigor and tart beauty are just what the part demands, and the shrewd head for politics is convincingly assumed.

"Star for a Night" is an inconsequential bit about exaggerated filial devotion. Claire Trevor and Evelyn Venable, both rather neutral young women, pretend to be riding high so that their mother back in Austria will accept money to be spent to her blind eyes. When mamma comes to America the deception is a little harder, and then when she regains her sight there is the utmost consternation as to how to pull the wool over the freshly-cured-eyes. It's pretty sugary up to this point, but when Mother Jane Darwell discovers the fraud, things get stickier than ever.