From its title alone, A Woman Rebels sounds like a great vehicle for Katharine Hepburn, and to some extent it is. But the film takes so long in establishing its heroine's situation (her love life hamstrung by a dark secret from her past) that what could have been the meat of the story -- Pamela's growing political awareness and her career as a crusading journalist -- seems truncated by the plot machinations swirling around her "niece" Flora (Elizabeth Allan) and Pamela's persistent suitor, the diplomat Thomas Lane (Herbert Marshall). Though Marshall and Hepburn really do strike sparks, and in his film debut Van Heflin impresses as Pamela's first lover, the story leaves Pamela's real accomplishments largely to the viewer's imagination. Its best sequence -- Flora applying for jobs as a secretary and retail clerk, positions not open to women in Victorian times -- hints of a more interesting film that could have followed her career more closely and shown how she overcame custom and tradition to appeal to women yearning for some measure of respect. Though Thomas' last line, "These modern women are so weak," is uttered with a wry twist, it's also true that Pamela is at that moment enfolded in his embrace and her fate in his hands. It's not exactly the way you'd expect a picture about a pioneering feminist to wrap up.
