|
|
Post by electricmastro on Dec 17, 2022 3:41:02 GMT
A thread dedicated to the films of the pre-code era of 1929-1934. Not obvious ones like Scarface and The Public Enemy, but also lesser-known ones, including one I felt to also mention, The Beast of the City:
|
|
|
|
Post by sepiatone on Dec 17, 2022 17:55:35 GMT
I've seen that one a few times on TCM, but it is a good 'un. Can't find a film clip of this one, but how about a still?  Won't let me resize, but it's from LADIES OF HE BIG HOUSE(1931) Sepiatone |
|
|
|
Post by electricmastro on Dec 17, 2022 23:40:05 GMT
I've seen that one a few times on TCM, but it is a good 'un. Can't find a film clip of this one, but how about a still? Won't let me resize, but it's from LADIES OF HE BIG HOUSE(1931) Sepiatone There are clips like this pinch. lol  |
|
|
|
Post by cineclassics on Dec 18, 2022 22:20:48 GMT
Blonde Crazy from 1931 is a breezy comedy featuring the great screen pairing of James Cagney and Joan Blondell. They also co-star in possibly my favorite pre-code musical, Footlight Parade. ![]()  I've always wondered why Cagney and Blondell's amazing chemistry in films isn't as routinely mentioned alongside other Old Hollywood pairings like Bogie/Bacall and Tracy/Hepburn. I guess the obvious difference is that Cagney and Blondell weren't intimate off the screen, unlike the other two dynamic duos. |
|
|
|
Post by Fading Fast on Dec 18, 2022 22:50:10 GMT
Blonde Crazy from 1931 is a breezy comedy featuring the great screen pairing of James Cagney and Joan Blondell. They also co-star in possibly my favorite pre-code musical, Footlight Parade. ![]() View AttachmentI've always wondered why Cagney and Blondell's amazing chemistry in films isn't as routinely mentioned alongside other Old Hollywood pairings like Bogie/Bacall and Tracy/Hepburn. I guess the obvious difference is that Cagney and Blondell weren't intimate off the screen, unlike the other two dynamic duos. |
|
|
|
Post by ando on Dec 19, 2022 0:02:43 GMT
 ME AND MY GAL (1932, Raoul Walsh) Thirties waterfront yarn with Spencer Tracy as a tough cop who falls for gum chewing waitress, Joan Bennett, whose sister gets involved with a gangster that Tracy has to corner. It's a favorite - dumb fun that's memorable mostly because of Tracy and Bennett - and the snappy dialogue! |
|
|
|
Post by sepiatone on Dec 19, 2022 17:28:33 GMT
I've always wondered why Cagney and Blondell's amazing chemistry in films isn't as routinely mentioned alongside other Old Hollywood pairings like Bogie/Bacall and Tracy/Hepburn. I guess the obvious difference is that Cagney and Blondell weren't intimate off the screen, unlike the other two dynamic duos. I believe Myrna Loy and William Powell weren't intimate off screen yet their chemistry and movie pairings get mentioned a lot in various movie forums. Sepiatone |
|
|
|
Post by mrminiver on Dec 20, 2022 6:04:43 GMT
Not sure if it's obvious or not but Baby Face is the first one that comes to my mind.
|
|
|
|
Post by ando on Dec 26, 2022 4:34:15 GMT
 CHICAGO (1927, Frank Urson) A wild jazz-loving and boozing wife Roxie Hart, kills her boyfriend in cold blood after he leaves her.
Based on the Broadway play of the same name and long before Bob Fossee or Rob Marshall, who both adapted it, were even heard of this silent classic from the DeMille Studios was the first film version. And a fine one at that. Recently restored. Free on the Tube. |
|
|
|
Post by ando on Dec 26, 2022 4:52:27 GMT
Ooops, just realized that suggestions should be within the 1929-34 time period. So silents are mostly out. Here's an interesting one about old vaudeville -
 The Dance of Life (1929, John Cromwell & A. Edward Sutherland) An older comic and a pretty young dancer aren't having much luck in their separate careers, so they decide to combine their acts, and to save money on the road, they get married.
Rough production values and the musical numbers are dreadful (though highly amusing) but it's all fun. Free on the Tube.
|
|
|
|
Post by Andrea Doria on Dec 26, 2022 19:44:33 GMT
"Baby Face" was the first one I thought of too, I've watched it several times, always fascinated. I have trouble finding pre-codes so I'm glad to see these suggestions.
|
|
|
|
Post by Swithin on Dec 27, 2022 14:11:03 GMT
Before MGM and Warner Brothers gave us the San Francisco earthquake (San Francisco, 1936; The Sisters, 1938), First National Pictures gave us Frisco Jenny (1932), my favorite pre-code film.
The movie opens in a huge saloon where Jenny Sandoval (Ruth Chatterton), daughter of the saloon's owner (Robert Emmett O'Connor), is in love with the pianist. Jenny's father is vehemently opposed to the union, and when Jenny tells him she's pregnant, her father gives her such a slap that it seems to cause the earthquake, which happens at that moment. Jenny's father and her lover are killed. To make ends meet, Jenny turns to a life of vice and becomes a sort of vice queen. At one point, she has to give up her baby, but as he grows up to become a football star, and later, the district attorney (played by Donald Cook), Jenny lovingly saves news clippings about him. Later in the film, Steve Dutton (played by Louis Calhern), a corrupt lawyer and associate of Jenny, threatens to "out" her successful son as the son of vice queen Jenny. To save her son's reputation, she shoots Steve.
Jenny is arrested and prosecuted by her own DA son, making this film a kind of inverted Madame X. In Madame X, the son of the accused woman is the lawyer who, not knowing the accused is his mother, gets her acquitted; in Frisco Jenny, the son of the accused is the DA who sends her to the gallows. In both cases, the accused women, who have had extenuating circumstances for their actions, refuse to reveal the identity of their sons.
Jenny's one friend is Amah, a Chinese woman (played by Helen Jerome Eddy), who pleads with Jenny to reveal the truth and save her life. (The DA does feel a bond with the woman he's sending to the gallows, and tries to pry the truth out of her). But Jenny refuses, and tells Amah to burn the clippings that she's lovingly saved and pasted into albums.
The last scene of Frisco Jenny is one of the most powerful in movie history. Director William Wellman shoots the scene from behind the fireplace, into which Amah is tossing the clippings. The movie's theme song, "My Gal Sal," is played over the scene. It's an incredibly moving end to a great pre-code movie.
In addition to great performances, Fresco Jenny excels in creating the mood of the early 20th century, with production design and use of period music. One of the screenwriters was Wilson Mizner, who collaborated on the scripts of many pre-code films, including One Way Passage. Mizner and his brother Addison were the subjects of Road Show, a Stephen Sondheim musical.
|
|
|
|
Post by Fading Fast on Dec 27, 2022 14:35:54 GMT
Before MGM and Warner Brothers gave us the San Francisco earthquake (San Francisco, 1936; The Sisters, 1938), First National Pictures gave us Frisco Jenny (1932), my favorite pre-code film.
The movie opens is a huge saloon where Jenny Sandoval (Ruth Chatterton), daughter of the saloon's owner (Robert Emmett O'Connor), is in love with the pianist. Jenny's father is vehemently opposed to the union, and when Jenny tells him she's pregnant, her father gives her such a slap that it seems to cause the earthquake, which happens at that moment. Jenny's father and her lover are killed. To make ends meet, Jenny turns to a life of vice and becomes a sort of vice queen. At one point, she has to give up her baby, but as he grows up to become a football star, and later, the district attorney (played by Donald Cook), Jenny lovingly saves news clippings about him. Later in the film, Steve Dutton (played by Louis Calhern), a corrupt lawyer and associate of Jenny, threatens to "out" her successful son as the son of vice queen Jenny. To save her son's reputation, she shoots Steve.
Jenny is arrested an prosecuted by her own DA son, making this film a kind of inverted Madame X. In Madame X, the son of the accused woman is the lawyer who, not knowing the accused is his mother, gets her acquitted; in Frisco Jenny, the son of the accused is the DA who sends her to the gallows. In both cases, the accused women, who have had extenuating circumstances for their actions, refuse to reveal the identity of their sons.
Jenny's one friend is Amah, a Chinese woman (played by Helen Jerome Eddy), who pleads with Jenny to reveal the truth and save her life. (The DA does feel a bond with the woman he's sending to the gallows, and tries to pry the truth out of her). But Jenny refuses, and tells Amah to burn the clippings that she's lovingly saved and pasted into albums.
The last scene of Frisco Jenny is one of the most powerful in movie history. Director William Wellman shoots the scene from behind the fireplace, into which Amah is tossing the clippings. The movie's theme song, "My Gal Sal," is played over the scene. It's an incredibly moving end to a great pre-code movie.
In addition to great performances, Fresco Jenny excels in creating the mood of the early 20th century, with production design and use of period music. One of the screenwriters was Wilson Mizner, who collaborated on the scripts of many pre-code films, including One Way Passage. Mizner and his brother Addison were the subjects of Road Show, a Stephen Sondheim musical.
|
|
|
|
Post by cineclassics on Dec 27, 2022 17:53:54 GMT
Before MGM and Warner Brothers gave us the San Francisco earthquake (San Francisco, 1936; The Sisters, 1938), First National Pictures gave us Frisco Jenny (1932), my favorite pre-code film.
The movie opens in a huge saloon where Jenny Sandoval (Ruth Chatterton), daughter of the saloon's owner (Robert Emmett O'Connor), is in love with the pianist. Jenny's father is vehemently opposed to the union, and when Jenny tells him she's pregnant, her father gives her such a slap that it seems to cause the earthquake, which happens at that moment. Jenny's father and her lover are killed. To make ends meet, Jenny turns to a life of vice and becomes a sort of vice queen. At one point, she has to give up her baby, but as he grows up to become a football star, and later, the district attorney (played by Donald Cook), Jenny lovingly saves news clippings about him. Later in the film, Steve Dutton (played by Louis Calhern), a corrupt lawyer and associate of Jenny, threatens to "out" her successful son as the son of vice queen Jenny. To save her son's reputation, she shoots Steve.
Jenny is arrested and prosecuted by her own DA son, making this film a kind of inverted Madame X. In Madame X, the son of the accused woman is the lawyer who, not knowing the accused is his mother, gets her acquitted; in Frisco Jenny, the son of the accused is the DA who sends her to the gallows. In both cases, the accused women, who have had extenuating circumstances for their actions, refuse to reveal the identity of their sons.
Jenny's one friend is Amah, a Chinese woman (played by Helen Jerome Eddy), who pleads with Jenny to reveal the truth and save her life. (The DA does feel a bond with the woman he's sending to the gallows, and tries to pry the truth out of her). But Jenny refuses, and tells Amah to burn the clippings that she's lovingly saved and pasted into albums.
The last scene of Frisco Jenny is one of the most powerful in movie history. Director William Wellman shoots the scene from behind the fireplace, into which Amah is tossing the clippings. The movie's theme song, "My Gal Sal," is played over the scene. It's an incredibly moving end to a great pre-code movie.
In addition to great performances, Fresco Jenny excels in creating the mood of the early 20th century, with production design and use of period music. One of the screenwriters was Wilson Mizner, who collaborated on the scripts of many pre-code films, including One Way Passage. Mizner and his brother Addison were the subjects of Road Show, a Stephen Sondheim musical.
Great review and a film I have not yet seen. I have added it to my "watchlist." |
|
|
|
Post by Swithin on Dec 27, 2022 17:56:58 GMT
Apologies, I did give spoilers, should have pointed that out at the top!
|
|
