I enjoyed how director Charles Laughton blended in elements from old silent films. If you're into the little things like camera work, staging, and deliberate sets it is worth watching. It also stars an older Lillian Gish one of Hollywood's original leading ladies. What really struck me was finding out how controversial this film was. Wow! How society has fallen. Now Hollywood pumps out garbage and no one bats an eye. Sure Hollywood has always been degenerate but at least they were doing a decent job of hiding it at the time. >The Legion of Decency gave the film a B because it degraded marriage, and the Protestant Motion Picture Council rated it "objectionable", saying that any religious person would be offended by it. The film was also banned in Memphis, Tennessee, by the city's head of censorship, Lloyd Binford.[71][9] Great Britain rated the film "adults only."[9] Once scene that bothered me because it didn't make much sense was when... [towards the end Pearl runs and embraces the preacher. This is after he previously terrorized her and had her in tears. Didn't make sense for her to treat him warmly after that.](#spoiler) Otherwise I thought the film worked really well. Perhaps the change of character of the mother (Shelly Winters) was too quick after meeting the preacher, but that isn't a big gripe.