One of the worst films Gary Cooper or Ingrid Bergman ever made. What were they thinking with this? I adore Ingrid. She's very high on my list of favorite actresses. But she is absolutely dreadful in this! She overacts and chews scenery like few I've ever seen. Poor miscast Gary Cooper looks like he doesn't know what he got himself into. Don't even get me started on Ingrid's friends -- Flora Robson in blackface and a dwarf. I expected Bela Lugosi and the Bowery Boys to pop up at any minute! The script is cringeworthy. Watching actors you respect say painfully bad lines is not fun. You could tell in some scenes Cooper wished he could be anywhere else but filming this mess. To make a bad movie worse, the darned thing goes on forever. A running time of over two hours in the 1940s was usually reserved for epics. Makes me wonder if WB foolishly thought this was going to be another Gone with the Wind. Anyway, a total dud but fans of these two great movie stars might want to check it out just for curiosity's sake.

I'll leave it to one of the ladies to give us judgment on Gary Cooper's charm.For me, this is Ingrid Bergman at her absolute best. Shot just after Casablanca, the screenplay and Sam Wood's common sense choose to focus on Ingrid in every scene but the brief, although well done, train wreck and brawl.She is radiant, sly, coquettish, warm, reactive, piercing, soft, hard. Most of all, she is desirable. A woman for all time, for all women.And she is strong. Melting for a brief second, gathering her resolve and forging ahead with her plans and schemes.The Edna Ferber novel has enough truth to provide a reasonable story line for Ingrid to carry along single handedly. Cooper and Jerry Austin as Cupidon are excellent. Florence Bates gets too little time, too late as a matron with claws.And French, yes, bless them, they allowed Ingrid to speak French, which she did so beautifully.The current 6.2 Yahoo rating is laughable. "Saratoga Trunk" may not be a "Casablanca" or "Notorious" but it is far better than this lowly rating. See for yourself.

"Saratoga Trunk" is a 1945 film starring Ingrid Bergman and Gary Cooper. It's based on a 1941 book by the great Edna Ferber. Subconsciously she may have had Gone with the Wind on the brain; parts of the story reminded me of GWTW.Set in the 1890s, Clio Dulaine is an illegitimate child who returns from New Orleans from France with a mulatto servant (Flora Robson) and a dwarf servant, Cupidon (Jerry Austin). She has given herself a Countess title and claims to be a widow. Her mother killed her father by accident, and his family shunned her. Clio takes over the old homestead with the idea of embarrassing her half-sister and the wife of her father, which she does by calling great attention to herself. Her plan is to marry someone very wealthy who can give her the security and respectability she craves. Then she spots Clint Maroon (Cooper), a Texas gambler, and falls for him. The two have a volatile relationship - and he doesn't have any money, so she can't marry him - so he leaves for Saratoga Springs. Eventually the Dulaine family has enough, and their attorney gives her $10,000 to get out of town. She does. She goes to Saratoga Springs and goes after the owner of the railroad, Bart von Steed. But Clint is always around.Bergman is beautiful in dark hair and wearing the period costumes, and Cooper is drop-dead gorgeous with that incredible 300-watt smile of his. How she could resist him is beyond me. And the love scenes - whoa, what chemistry! The supporting cast is excellent, Robson and Cupidon creating interesting characters, and Florence Bates giving an excellent performance as a socially prominent woman who takes Clio under her wing, knowing she's a big fake.The film runs a little long, and some of the acting may seem old-fashioned today, but it's an absorbing story filled with atmosphere and vivid performances. The ending won't come as any surprise. It's a fun journey, though.

I would rate this film high on my list of Ingrid Bergman films. Ingrid's beauty aside, her talent is evident in scene after scene. She was sad, mean, witty,snobbish, flirtatious, delightfully funny, loving, tender, sorrowful, distressed, happy, etc. You name it, she was all those things and more. -And soconvincing. Ingrid plays a notorious woman (Clio) who comes back to NewOrleans and falls for a Texas gambler, Gary Cooper (Clint). I especially loved the scene where they are sitting at the dining table saying nothing, just staring at each other. She, in an elegant white gown and he in a handsome white cowboyoutfit, sitting there looking at her adoringly. What chemistry! What love!