Though her screen time in The Women is relatively brief, Joan Crawford steals every scene she's in. She's completely believable and sexy as "the other woman", and delivers a performance that, with the exception of Rosalind Russel's, steals the film from the all star cast. The supporting players are equally entertaining. Paulette Godard makes the most of her tough as nails character, Lucille Watson once again shows how intelligent a woman with experience can really be, and Mary Boland relishes with her backstabbing, two faced part. Truly a classic movie, almost everyone will find something to enjoy with The Women.

By 1939, Joan Crawford's career had been on the wane for three years. Out of her previous seven films, only Love on the Run (1936) had performed successfully. When she renewed her MGM contract in 1938, her salary had dropped from $125,000 to $100,000 a picture. Well, duh! Her movies after 1934 were lackluster, and too predictable to draw long lines at the box office, but it wasn't her fault. MGM soaked her dry for box office, squeezing every last penny out of her. With The Women, Joan Crawford not only revived her career, but also proved she could act. She is indeed cold blooded, but to call her villain is overrating her. She's just portraying a woman who is determined to get herself on the right side of the tracks, just like old times. Joan Crawford is what made The Women so successful.

For Norma Shearer fans however, it was the perfect example of her Hollywood demise. Though her performance is virtually excellent considering she didn't have much to work with, 1939's The Women was a slap in the face to the image Norma had acquired after her Oscar winning performance in The Divorcee (1930). The character of Mary Haines is respectable, but she becomes a distraction after awhile, making one wish Crystal Allan would have been focused on more. When Mary catches her husband having an affair, she insists on getting a divorce to maintain her pride. It sounds like an revival of the Norma Shearer precode days, but it's obvious throughout the movie she wants nothing to return to her husband, and pitifully does in the end. When Norma finds out that Chester Morris has been fooling around in The Divorcee, sure she divorces him, but before she leaves, she goes out and has sex with her husband's best friend, Robert Montgomery. Could a jilted wife find any other way for real revenge?

As a single gal in The Women, Norma holds herself together best as she can. She finds no other lovers to distract her. She has no meaningless affairs. In The Divorcee, Norma Shearer's life of extremely exciting sexual adventure clearly makes an idiot of her husband, and Chester Morris remains bitter towards her. Norma's sex life gets so out of control, at least by 1930's standards, Chester has no choice but move to Europe to start over. In Divorcee, she asks Conrad Nagel, "What should an ex wife do? Spend her days doing good deeds? Going to bed at night with suitable books?" Norma's days as an ex wife in The Women are so completely different from her single days nine years earlier, it's hard to imagine that the same star could excel in portraying both women. Well, at least it's proof of how versatile she was.

Joan Crawford lobbied desperately to Louis B. Mayer and George Cukor to let her play Crystal Allan, Norma Shearer never wanted to make The Women. After achieving her enormous comeback in Marie Antoinette (1938), which grossed more money than any previous MGM movie, Norma followed it up with one of her most entertaining films, Idiot's Delight (1939). When Norma wanted to follow up the latter film with Pride and Prejudice (1940), Louis B Mayer told her she would indeed star in it if she made The Women first, and she unwillingly agreed. Then Mayer, after promising her the part opposite Lawrence Olivier and for a prestigious production on location in England, pulled an unexpected punch and gave the part to Greer Garson for his own personal revenge on Norma for not selling Irving Thalberg's percent of MGM profits. (The percentage deal made her a very wealthy woman until she died.)

Unfortunately, this virtually excellent picture is the most known Norma Shearer movie, and probably the key to why it has turned the public against her. She does come off as boring and dull, but she can't help it, and the movie as a whole is perfect. Fortunately now her naughty precodes have gotten an ample amount of attention with the publishing of Mick LaSalle's "Complicated Women", and for anyone who has enjoyed the sexy Joan Crawford in The Women (1939), they will no doubt find Norma Shearer just as exciting in The Divorcee (1930).