Category Archives: Pre-Code Reviews

Mexicali Rose
Directed by Erle C. Kenton
Written by Norman Houston and Gladys Lehman
1929/US
Columbia Pictures
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/YouTube

”No gold-digging for me; I take diamonds! We may be off the gold standard someday.” – Mae West

Barbara Stanwyck is the best thing about this early talkie potboiler and that’s not saying much.

Happy Manning (Sam Hardy) runs a saloon/gambling hall on the Mexican side of the border. He is generous and beloved by his customers. He dotes on his ward, who is a big U.S. high school football star.

He is married to the much younger Mexicali Rose (Stanwyck). Rose is a huge flirt and Happy finds out about an affair she had while he was away on business.  He throws her out with enough money to get, and stay, on the other side of the border. Unfortunately, that leaves her within striking range of his ward.

Stanwyck is good at being a bad girl. She doesn’t exactly have the chance to shine in this low-budget 60-minute B movie though.

Collection of fun clips

The Locked Door
Directed by George Fitzmaurice
Written by C. Gardner Sullivan from a play by Channing Pollock
1929/US
Feature Productions
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube

Ann Carter: You won’t gain anything by keeping me here!
Frank Devereaux: Oh, I like you in a temper. I want to hold you close, knowing you don’t want to be held.

Continuing my Barbara Stanwyck pre-Code retrospective with a rewatch of this creaky early talkie, which contains her first starring role.

I’ll point you at my original review for the plot summary.  Couldn’t find much media at that time.  Here’s a couple of photos that illustrate the high melodrama of the piece.

This is not a good movie but Stanwyck is pretty good in it.  She has a couple of scenes where she lets loose with her fire and reveals a glimpse of things to come.

Clip

Night Nurse
Directed by William A. Wellman
Written by Oliver H.P. Garrett and Charles Kenyon from a novel by Grace Perkins
1930/US
Warner Brothers
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Prime rental

Maloney: Take my tip and stay away from interns. They’re like cancer… the disease is known but not the cure.

Pre-code classic with the perfect cast and lots of snappy dialogue.

As the movie starts, Lora Hart (Barbara Stanwyck) is applying for a nurse training program at a local hospital.  The director of nursing is an old bat who rejects Lora for her origins and lack of high school diploma.  But a kindly old doctor recommends her and she is immediately accepted.  In training with Lora is Maloney (Joan Blondell).  The two become roommates and have adventures, many involving undressing or dressing.  One that doesn’t has the two nurses treating bootlegger Mortie’s bullet wound on the quiet.  Mortie starts his campaign to win Lora.

The first jobs Maloney and Lora get after graduating is shifts at the house of a wealthy alcoholic mother of two.  Mom’s life is one round of drunken parties after another.  She has taken up with hunky but sinister “chauffeur” Nick (Clark Gable).  In the meantime, the little girls are slowly dying of starvation.  Lora fights like the dickens to get them out of the control of their scheming doctor (Ralf Harolde).

This Pre-Code classic is great fun what with all the disrobing, fisticuffs, and straighttalking (“you mother!”). It  combines two of my favorite things – a feisty Barbara Stanwyck and a great pre-code vibe. Add in Blondell and Gable and you’re in essential territory.  Highly recommended.

Night Nurse was the last film in which Clark Gable played the bad guy.

Reaching for the Moon
Directed by Edmund Goulding
Written by Edmund Goulding and Elsie Janis based on a story with music by Irving Berlin
1930/US
Feature Productions (A Joseph M. Schenck production)
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Fandor

Roger: There’s a vast difference, sir, between the art of making money and the art of making… a lady.

A peppy but routine Pre-Code romcom enlivened by its cast and luscious art deco settings and costumes.

A devil-may-care aviatrix (Bebe Daniels) bets her buddies that she can get the attention of a dashing financier (Douglas Fairbanks). When she does, he pursues her on her sea voyage across the Atlantic. At first, the whole thing is a big joke to Bebe. With Edward Everett Horton as Fairbanks’ butler, Claud Allister as a British twit, and Bing Crosby, in his first solo performance on film, singing “When the Folks High Up Do the Mean Low-Down”.

I had mixed feelings about Fairbanks’ truly manic performance. He leaped about enough for a couple of swashbucklers. However, I found Bebe Daniels totally captivating. I never knew why she got top billing in “42nd Street” and now I do. It’s too bad she married and moved to England before her career solidified. However, the real reason to watch this movie is to see William Cameron Menzies art deco set designs. They are absolutely gorgeous. I need Fairbanks’ bed! The costumes are good too.

Up the River
Directed by John Ford
Written by Maurine Dallas Watkins
1930/US
Fox Film Corporation
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/YouTube

May: [May and June, twin sisters singing part of “The Prisoner’s Song” on the hayride wagon] ‘I’ll be carried to the new jail tomorrow, Leaving my poor darling alone, With the cold prison bars all around me, And my head on a pillow of stone…

Humphrey Bogart shines as a romantic lead in his first feature film.

Implausible but fun Fox prison comedy. I was about to explain the plot but it’s pretty complicated and really doesn’t make much sense. Suffice it to say that this prison is quite comfortable in many aspects. Spencer Tracy is a cocky career criminal/convict and Humphrey Bogart (looking very young and handsome) is an upper crust prisoner who falls in love with one of women convicts.

This movie manages to have choral singing, a talent show, a baseball game, a hay ride, and a romance all wrapped up in a prison story. It should have been a mess but I thought it worked in spite of itself.

This is the only movie in which Bogart and Tracy co-starred.  Both were making their feature film debuts.

The man could certainly act!

Seven Days Leave
Directed by Richard Wallace
Written by John Farrow and Dan Totheroh from a play by J.M. Barrie
1930/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube

“All the world is made of faith, and trust, and pixie dust.” ― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Never Never Land meets WWI in this sentimental story of mother love.

The story is set in WWI London.  Sarah Ann Dowey (Beryl Mercer is a humble widowed charwoman who is getting up in years.  She begins the story searching for a way to make a contribution to the war effort.  The only solution the Ministry of War can agree to is her offer to be charwoman at the Ministry.  She is very sociable and chats with her co-workers for a cup of tea and a good gossip at the local pub.  All her friends have sons in the war.  So she sets about creating one for herself.  She finds a newspaper article about a man named K. Dowey, who is in the prestigious Black Guard,  and his exploits in the war.  She has a vivid imagination and talks about him as if he was real.

Cut to Pvt. Kenneth Dowey (Gary Cooper in a Kilt!) in the trenches.  Dowey is a Canadian orphan who volunteered to serve in the British Army but became disillusioned by the endless war and deplorable conditions.  He is a known trouble maker. He has recently been wounded and is eligible for seven days leave. The brass give him this although they it expect to end badly and even doubt that he will return.

Dowey heads to London where he checks in to the YMCA.  Miraculously, a clergyman knows about Mrs. Dowey and steers Kenneth toward her house.  He initially goes there to chew her out but gradually melts under the outpouring of love by the old widow.  He reciprocates by showing her the high tone side of London.  I’ll stop here.

This is a unique movie.  You have to have the mindset to imagine this is a happy and sad fairy tale.  If you can, you will accept the Beryl Mercers extravagant performance as a slightly daft old lady with a good heart.  She is excellent at conveying this. It’s been awhile since I’ve see Cooper in a comic role.  I’m in awe of his straight-faced humorous delivery.  All in all, I enjoyed this movie.  Recommended but be aware that it is very sentimental and becomes melodramatic toward the end.

Tribute to Gary Cooper narrated by his Daughter

Ladies of Leisure
Directed by Frank Capra
Written by Jo Swerling from a play by Milton Herbert Gropper
1930/US
Columbia Pictures
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Crackle

Dot Lamar: You can’t weigh sex appeal.

I love a good melodrama when it makes me cry.

This Pre-Code romcom/melodrama begins at the studio of artist Jerry Strong (Ralph Graves) where a wild drunken party is in progress. When Jerry flees the highjinks, he meets cute with Kay Arnold (Barbara Stanwyck) a self-proclaimed “party girl” who is fleeing a party she attended on a ship. Jerry is sees something in her which represents “hope” to him and asks her to pose for a portrait. The two leads have quirky counterparts in the form of Kay’s roommate fellow party girl Dot (Marie Provost) and Jerry’s playboy friend Bill (Lowell Sherman).

Jerry keeps things strictly platonic and it is not too long before Kay is madly in love with him. Can these two opposites attract?   Not to give away too much but the course of true love never did run smooth.

I liked this far more on the rewatch than the first time around.  It is really quite a touching love story. Barbara Stanwyck is wonderful throughout. Last time I thought she cried too much in the second half. This time I was crying right along with her.  Even this early in her career she could deliver heartbreaking performances like this one.  Recommended.

Clip (spoiler from near end of movie)

International House
Directed by A. Edward Sutherland
Written by Francis Martin and Walter DeLeon
1933/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb Page
Repeat viewing/Criterion Channel

[Peggy finds a litter of assorted kittens on her seat]
Peggy: I wonder what their parents were.
Professor Quail: Careless, my little dove cake, careless.

Another preposterous story allows Paramount to show off its stable of talent.

Professor Wong  is ready to show off and sell his new invention, “radioscope” – i.e., television.  People come from all over the world to the International House Hotel in Wu Hu (you can imagine the jokes), China to bid on the phenomenon.  The principal rivals are a Russian (Bela Lugosi) and young American Tommy Nash (Stuart Erwin).  Both of these have romantic troubles.  Professor Quail (W.C. Fields) drops in in his auto-gyro.  With Burns and Allen; Rudy Vallee; Sterling Holloway; Francis Pangborn; Cab Calloway; and Baby Rose Marie.

This is 68 minutes of fun.  But Cab Calloway’s “Reefer Man” number alone makes the film worth watching.  Baby Rose Marie belts out a perverse version of “My Bluebird’s Singing the Blues”.  I enjoyed myself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EziqHFpFNmQ

This Day and Age
Directed by Cecil B. deMille
Written by Bartlett Cormack
1933/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

“And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations.
They’re quite aware of what they’re going through. – “Changes” by David Bowie

Cecil  B. DeMille makes even a crime story into an epic.

A high school holds a “Boy’s Day” in which the senior boys shadow city officials such as a District Attorney, a Chief of Police, a Judge, etc.  Simultaneously, a Jewish tailor is slain by Louis Garrett (Charles Bickford), the boss of a protection racket.  The boys try to get justice for their friend from the officials they are shadowing.  They learn the justice system is entirely corrupt.  So they organize the boys from all the high schools to apprehend Garrett for some vigilante justice.  Part of their scheme involves Gay Merrick’s (Judith Allen) agreement with her boyfriend (Richard Cromwell) to detain an enforcer who “likes his olives green”.  With John Carradine under the name John Peter Richmond in a small part as an Assistant Principal.

This is a strange movie to say the least.  The story and dialogue are somewhat naive.   But deMille directs the cast of thousands to great effect.  The “trial” at the end reminded me of the trial by the criminals in Fritz Lang’s M (1931), without the pathos of Peter Lorre. Very pre-Code.

I’m No Angel
Directed by Wesley Ruggles
Written by Mae West
1933/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Criterion Channel

Tira: Beulah, peel me a grape.

This has everything a Mae West movie should have, including a young Cary Grant.

Tira (West) is a sensation with her act in the sidehow of a circus.  She plays her many admirers like a fiddle.  Most of this involves the receipt of diamond bracelets and some sexual innuendos.  Finally, Tira is courted by Kirk Lawrence (Kent Taylor) and he asks her to marry him.  Problem is Kirk is already engaged.  Both the fiancee and friend Jack Clayton (Grant) try to persuade her to drop him.

Jack does succeed in breaking up the relationship but only because he falls in love with Tira himself.  When he hears damning information, he calls off their engagement.  This leads to a funny breach of promise trial.

The suggestive one-liners fly and West does some good musical numbers.  I’m especially fond of “They Call Me Sister Honky Tonk”.  I enjoyed this one a lot.