Category Archives: Pre-Code Reviews

Dixiana
Directed by Luther Reed
Written by Luther Reed and Anne Caldwell
1930/US
RKO Radio Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube

Peewee: Madame, do you know the cigar game?

Unless you are a fan of mediocre melodramatic operettas, the only reason to see this is the comic relief provided by Wheeler and Woolsey.

The story takes place in the antebellum South, mostly in New Orleans.  Dixiana (Bebe Daniels) is the star of a “circus” (looks more like some kind of musical review).  She loves Carl Van Horn (Everett Marshall), a Southern gentleman.  He brings her home to meet his parents and her mother will not have a circus performer in the family.  In the meantime, evil casino owner Royal Montague (Ralf Harolde) schemes to make her his own.

Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey are performers in the show and are always around when something is going on with Dixiana.  Dorothy Lee shows up late in the proceedings to do her obligatory song and dance with Wheeler.  Bill ‘Bojangles’ Robinson does a tap dance in the show.  It was his first film appearance.

If this had not had Wheeler and Woolsey, I would not have watched it.  They were enough to provide some entertainment.  Otherwise this is just mediocre.  The songs, other than the Wheeler and Lee number aren’t catchy and are sung in overblown operatic voices.

This Is the Night
Directed by Frank Tuttle
Written by Benjamin Glazer and George Marion Jr. from a play by Henry Falk and Rene Peter
1932/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Gerald Gray: Claire, the moment you meet a man, right after you’ve said ‘how do you do?’ you should add ‘my husband throws javelins’.

Sophisticated early screwball comedy has that Lubitsch touch, without Lubitsch.

Stephen Mattewson (Cary Grant) is competing in the javelin event at the 1932 Los Angeles Oympics.  He returns home to Paris early, just in time to catch wife Claire (Thelma Todd) evidently planning a trip to Venice with paramour Gerald Grey (Roland Young).  Friend of the family Bunny West (Charles Ruggles) tells Stephen the two tickets were for Gerald and his new wife.  Stephen insists that he and Claire will accompany them on the trip.  So Gerald has to come up with a wife.  He does, in the form of poor but spectacular Germaine (Lili Dalmita).

The foursome plus Bunny arrive in Venice.  From there on it is a comedy of errors in which everybody really knows what’s going on but each is trying to milk the last bit of embarrassment for the others out of the situation.

I have special affection for Young and Ruggles and they add a lot of wit to the film.  Cary Grant already had a handle on the perfect delivery for this kind of dialogue.  Paris and Venice are obviously on the studio back lot but charming none-the-less.  This picture contains some sung dialogue – as when taxi drivers inform the world that “Madame has lost her dress!  I got used to this rapidly.  It is not a musical by any means, though. Recommended.

This was Grant’s first film performance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_XGiE9wriM

Merrily We Go to Hell
Directed by Dorothy Arzner
Written by Edwin Justus Mayer from a play by Cleo Lucas
1931/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Joan Prentice: I spent the morning realizing that we’re living in a modern world – where there’s no place for old-fashioned wives. You seem to want a modern wife and that’s what I’m going to be. You see, I’d rather go merrily to Hell with you than alone.

The sad story of marriage to an alcoholic, expertly delivered by Sylvia Sidney and Fredric March.

Jerry Corbett (March) is an alcoholic newspaper reporter/aspiring playwright.  One night he chances to meet heiress Joan Corbett at a party.  He is attracted and she appears to be swept off her feet despite his evident inebriation.  During their courtship, Jerry lets Joan down over and over again.  Joan’s father violently objects to Jerry and opposes their eventual plans to marry.  But Joan remains madly in love and he realizes he can’t stop them and goes with the flow.

Joan helps Jerry sober up, settle down, and finish writing his play, which is about his breakup with his ex-girlfriend.  They are happy during this time.  Then the play is accepted for production.  The leading lady is the ex-girlfriend and soon Jerry is off the wagon again. The couple moves to New York.

The play is a great success.  Jerry shows up very late and totally blotto to his own cast party.  He takes up with the ex-girlfriend again, making no effort to disguise this from Joan.  So Joan decides that what is good for the gander is good for the goose.  She begins drinking and starts going to drinking parties with other men, including Charlie Baxter (Cary Grant).  Things sort of go downhill from there.  Can Hollywood pull out a happy ending?

I have long maintained that Fredric March makes the most believable drunk in classic cinema and Sylvia Sidney is a favorite.  Arzner saw that the production of this sad story was told with realism and a light touch on the melodrama.  Very worth seeing.

Restoration trailer – English with French subtitles

Other Men’s Women
Directed by William A. Wellman
Written by Maude Fulton and William K. Wells
1931/US
Warner Brothers
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Prime rental

Bill White: I love you, Lily. And I want ya. And if you are here or near me, I’ll take you. You understand? I’ll take you.

William Wellman blends exciting railway action with a love triangle made more palatable by the excellent acting of all concerned.

Bill White (Grant Withers) is a hard-drinking locomotive engineer and ladies’ man.  He is currently hanging out with drinking buddy Marie (Joan Blondell) who is after him to marry her.  He shares duties in the same locomotive with colleague and best friend Jack (Regis Toomey). Both are railroad men through and through.  Jack thinks Bill should settle down and invites him to dinner at his home with his wife Lily (Mary Astor).  Bill eventually moves in with the couple and quits drinking.

There has been an unspoken sexual tension between Bill and Lily.  One day, they declare their love and seal it with a kiss.  Bill decides the best thing to do is move out which leads Jack to figure out something is going on with Bill and Lily.

This revelation occurs on the locomotive and the two begin fist fighting furiously.  In the process, Jack is thrown off the train.  The incident leaves him blind.

Bill begins drinking again and is back with Marie.  I think I’ll stop here except to say that the climax of the film is an unbelievable but spectacular.  With James Cagney in a small speaking part as one of the railway workers.  He even does a little dance (see below)!

I love Mary Astor and I thought she was very appealing in this.  It’s Grant Withers’s movie though and he acquitted himself admirably.  As did everyone else.  If the fairly standard tragic love triangle is pretty routine, there is all that spectacular train action to enjoy.

Hot Saturday
Directed by William A. Seiter
Written by Seton I. Miller from a novel by Harvey Fergusson
1932/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Ruth Brock: Immoral women shouldn’t work in banks, you know. They might corrupt the young dollar bills.

Fun movie with a stellar cast and a wonderful unexpected ending.

All the boys are after bank clerk Ruth Brock (Nancy Carroll).  She is playing the field.  She agrees to go to a Saturday dance out by a lake with one of the tellers.  Hunky millionaire Romer Sheffield (Cary Grant) stops by the bank one day, is immediately attracted to Ruth and lays it on heavy with the compliments.  He hears of the trip to Willow Springs and offers to treat all the young people to a party at his mansion with real liquor and everything. Ruth is still not buying what he’s selling.  Everybody goes out to the dance, a traditional part of which is a romantic boat ride.  Ruth’s date, already frustrated by her attention to Romer, insists on some petting.  Ruth runs away to Romer’s house.  She stays up talking with him until late and then his chauffeur takes her home at 2 a.m.

A particularly mean girl of her acquaintance and her date spread the news of Ruth’s late arrival home.  Before the local gossip mill is through playing “Telephone” she has spent the night with Romer.

When Ruth returns home she finds straight-arrow childhood sweetheart Bill Fadden (Randolph Scott) in her kitchen.  They talk over old times.  They spend the next day together and it ends with an accepted marriage proposal.  On Monday, Ruth is fired from her job at the bank for immorality.  Bill has gone off for a week to do a geological survey. Ruth’s mother (Jane Darwell) is outraged at her indiscretion.  Nancy runs away in the pouring rain to Bill’s encampment.  I will go no further except to say that the ending is great and was totally unexpected by me.

This one simply screams Pre-Code.  Grant and Scott so young and beautiful.  I really enjoyed it.  Perfect short fun romance.

The Virtuous Sin

Directed by George Cukor and Louis J. Glasier
Written by Martin Brown and Louise Long from a play by Lajos Zilahy
1930/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb Page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

“We seem to be unable to resist overstating every aspect of ourselves: how long we are on the planet for, how much it matters what we achieve, how rare and unfair are our professional failures, how rife with misunderstandings are our relationships, how deep are our sorrows. Melodrama is individually always the order of the day.” ― Alain de Botton, Religion for Atheists: A Non-Believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion

Well, everyone has to start somewhere, Mr. Cukor.  Pity it had to be this overwrought melodrama.

The story takes place in Russia at the time of the country’s entry into World War I. Lt. Victor Sabin (Kenneth McKenna) is a genius medical researcher on the brink of great discoveries. Marya (Kay Francis) admires him greatly. He is in love with her and asks her to marry him. She agrees to a marriage in name only and will assist him in his research. The two are genuinely filled with love – the problem is that hers is platonic.

At precisely the wrong time, Victor gets called up to duty in the Russian Army. He does not want to do this and delays his arrival to post several times. General Gregori Platoff (Walter Huston) is severely displeased and demotes him to janitorial duties. Then Victor talks back and he is court martialed and sentenced to death.

Marya goes to his post to try to rescue him. The only person with authority to call off the execution is the General. He patronizes the local brothel so Marya gets a job there with the intention of seducing him.  This works better than she expected.  What will he do when he finds out he has been duped?  What will Marya do when his passion overcomes her?

I never thought Walter Huston could give a bad performance but he manages it here.  In fact, all the actors go over the top.  The overwrought dialogue doesn’t help.  Francis does rock her rather weird Russian attire, so there’s that.  Very missable, though it did hold my interest for its hour and twenty minutes run time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAU1msXfqY0

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Million Dollar Legs
Directed by Edward Cline
Written by Henry Myers and Nick Barrows from a story by Joseph L. Mankiewicz
1932/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Opening Title Card: Klopstokia… a far away country – – Chief Exports… Goats and Nuts – – Chief Imports … Goats and Nuts – – Chief Inhabitants … Goats and Nuts

Paramount brought its leading comics together for this hour-long laughfest.

Klopstokia is a tiny bankrupt country who principal products and inhabitants are goats and nuts.  These days it is more bankrupt than usual.  Brush salesman Migg Tweeny (Jack Oakie) comes to town.  Angela (all the girls in Klopstokia are named Angela) and Migg immediately fall madly in love.  Angela (Susan Fleming) is the daughter of the President (W.C. Fields), who rules on the basis of his ability to win at arm wrestling with his Cabinet.

Klopstokia is full of unheralded athletes and Migg gets the bright idea of asking his company to pay a prize to each athlete that wins a medal at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics.  Rebellious Members of Cabinet send spy Mata Machree (Lyda Roberti), the most irresistable woman in the world, with the team.  The idea is that she will seduce each in turn and destroy morale.

The plot, of course, is a device to hang a constant stream of sight gags and jokes.  These are silly but genuinely funny.  I had a smile on my face throughout.  Recommended.

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