Sass Mouth Dames Film Club Series 11

Megan McGurk presents four pre-Code smashers from 1932, Thursday nights in September, 2019.

Tickets available through Eventbrite

Blondie of the Follies (1932)

5 September

As Blondie McClune, Marion Davies has only one dress to her name. Although she saves money for a new one, her mother needs the cash to pay rent. Blondie’s oldest friend, Lurleen Cavanaugh, played by Billie Dove, lives in the same cold-water tenement, but soon moves into a penthouse after she lands a spot in the Follies, thanks to her ability to wear a skirt made of pearls. Lurleen changes her name to Lottie and develops notions. The story by Frances Marion and dialogue by Anita Loos captures a passionate rivalry between women who want to shed their origin. And Marion’s impression of Greta Garbo is not to be missed.

Barbara Stanwyck, Adolphe Menjou, Ralph Bellamy, Dorothy Peterson

Forbidden (1932)

12 September

In his memoir, Frank Capra described his goal as a director: ‘I would sing the songs of the working stiffs, of the short-changed Joes, the born poor, the afflicted. I would gamble with the long-shot players who light candles in the wind, and resent with the pushed-around because of race or birth. Above all, I would fight for their causes on the screens of the world.’ Capra also included the pushed-around Janes of the world in his pictures. He made five of them starring Barbara Stanwyck. In Forbidden, Capra’s answer to Back Street (1932), Stanwyck plays a small-town librarian. Tired of dull routine, Stanwyck longs for adventure. She cashes in her savings for a new wardrobe and lavish cruise, where she hooks up with a married man. Will she be content as a mistress?

Merrily We Go to Hell (1932)

19 September

Dorothy Arzner’s cautionary tale shows women why they should avoid a hasty marriage to a random lad from a party. Arzner’s picture scuppers the romantic myth that women can save men from themselves. Sylvia Sidney stars as a socialite who falls for a dissolute writer, played by Fredric March. Each time he proves unworthy, she ignores the facts. What happens when she agrees to a modern marriage on his terms? James Baldwin once wrote that Sylvia Sidney ‘was the only American film actress who reminded me of reality’. Sylvia Sidney bore her share of troubles onscreen with an angelic grace that was the antithesis of hardboiled dames from the pre-Code era.

Shanghai Express (1932)

26 September

Series 11 closes with the fourth film Marlene Dietrich made with Josef von Sternberg, which was the top-grossing film from a stand-out year for pre-Code woman’s pictures. Nominated for Best Picture and Best Director, it won for Best Cinematography from Lee Garmes. In an elaborate feathered costume designed by Travis Banton, Marlene looks like an exotic bird who longs for wings fast enough to carry her away from men. You can’t beat Dietrich and von Sternberg for style, mood, and dramatic atmosphere. Anna May Wong gives a standout supporting performance.

Sass Mouth Dames Film Club Series 8

Join Megan McGurk for a sterling collection of Pre-Code woman’s pictures. Let’s revisit an era when Hollywood took women on the screen and in the audience seriously.

Sass Mouth Dames Film Club Series 8 meets each Thursday night in January at 7.00, in the Brooks Hotel Cinema, Drury Street, Dublin.

Only a tenner in!

Tickets through Eventbrite.

Our Blushing Brides (1930)

3 January

In woman’s pictures, a reliable formula presents a cautionary tale of three women who seek to make their fortune. Set in a department store among women who work behind a counter, or model clothes as ‘mannequins,’ they pool resources in flat shares and skip lunches to afford clothes. Joan Crawford, Anita Page, and Dorothy Sebastian bide their time on stingy wages while they fend off a pack of society wolves. Joan Crawford tries to keep her friends from falling for the cheap lines pick up artists use. The picture includes fashion show sequences featuring swoonworthy designs by Adrian.

Safe in Hell (1931)

10 January

Next time you hear someone make a sarcastic comment about ‘Hollywood endings’, as a shortcut for saccharine fade outs, point them in the direction of Pre-Code Hollywood pictures like Safe in Hell. In one of the most notorious Pre-Codes, Dorothy Mackaill protects herself from a customer’s assault, and afterward, hides out in a Caribbean bolthole to avoid extradition. At first, she thinks boredom is her worst problem. When she accepts an invitation from the men who loiter in the hotel lounge, they compete for her as though she were a roast chicken at the end of forty day fast. William Wellman’s production reminds us that women are never safe when men are around.

Vanity Street (1932)

17 January

Helen Chandler, tired, hungry, and homeless, smashes a window so she can at least have three hots and a cot in prison. A police detective (Charles Bickford) takes pity on a woman down on her luck. He offers a meal and his sofa, and then gets her a job in a chorus line. The real star of this picture though is Mayo Methot, better known for being the third Mrs Bogart. Mayo Methot had a gift for playing characters who learn difficult truths about things like inconstant lovers and the fleeting nature of youth and fame. She lays bare the emotional contours of women who have been tossed aside. Not to be missed.

Ladies They Talk About (1933)

24 January

During a bank heist, Barbara Stanwyck gets pinched. She doesn’t squeal on her boyfriend’s criminal rackets. She hopes to gain the influence of a popular radio preacher she grew up with, and have the sentence suspended. The plan doesn’t work, so she joins the women’s prison as a ‘new fish’. Stanwyck proves a quick study for how to manage a dame looking for a fight. The scenes behind the walls resemble a sorority house more than the hoosegow. Despite a carceral effect, women on the inside mitigate their grim plight with decorative touches applied to their uniforms and jail cells. You can’t keep a good dame down, even when she’s behind bars.

Heat Lightning (1934)

31 January

Where do you go after you’ve had enough of men and life in a chorus line? If you’re Aline MacMahon, you get as far away as possible–the Mojave desert. She opens a filling station and café with her younger sister, played by Ann Dvorak. Wearing overalls, with her mermaid tresses tucked under a bandana, MacMahon limits her worries to heat, rattlesnakes, and keeping her sister out of trouble. Then one day an old flame (Preston Foster) shows up, on the run from the law. Suddenly the great big desert is too small. Cornered, with a siege mentality, a resourceful dame does what she must. To lighten the drama, Glenda Farrell and Ruth Donnelly trade barbs. Director Mervyn LeRoy doesn’t waste a moment in this 63-minute gem.

SASS MOUTH DAMES FILM CLUB SERIES 7

Megan McGurk presents a brand-new series of Pre-Code woman’s pictures.

Series 7 may be abbreviated, but three platinum blonde sass mouth dames provide a cure for what ails you. And I’ll return to screening five films for Series 8, each Thursday in January, 2019.

Join me in the Brooks Hotel Cinema.

Seating is limited, so book in early.

Tickets available through Eventbrite.

As You Desire Me (1932)

8 November, 7.00

You may be tempted to roll your eyes at the idea of amnesia used as a plot device, but Greta Garbo teases out subversive possibilities from a familiar trope. Without the encumbrance of memory and identity, a woman might become a bit reckless. She can turn platinum, sing on stage, demand more champagne, and juggle a retinue of admirers. Chief among the men who queue for Garbo is Erich von Stroheim, playing one of his all-time best scoundrels. Out of nowhere, Melvyn Douglas appears and claims to be Garbo’s long-lost husband. Does she trade a life of independence and intrigue to settle down with a dashing man in a uniform?

Blonde Venus (1932)

29 November, 7.00

Often imitated yet never equalled, Marlene Dietrich’s opening nightclub act still has the power to shock and enthral audiences. Wearing a platinum afro wig, with an African American chorus line, Dietrich’s playful revue mocks stereotypes about race and gender. The nightclub routine provides relief from Dietrich’s day job as wife and mother. After her husband (Herbert Marshall) suffers a health crisis, Dietrich struggles to be the sole provider for the family and pay for expensive medical care. She makes the ultimate sacrifice by having sex with Cary Grant for money. Nice work if you can get it.

I’m No Angel (1933)

6 December, 7.00

Mae West saved Paramount Studios from bankruptcy with racy hits such as Night After Night (1932) and She Done Him Wrong (1933). Box office receipts gave West the clout to develop the stories she wanted to tell. In this case, for her third picture for the studio, she indulged a life-long fantasy to play a lion-tamer. Before West graduates to snapping a whip in a cage around magnificent beasts, she plays a cooch dancer. While the men watch her shimmy, she takes stock of their jewellery. After the show, West stages a one-woman clip-joint to collect rings, tie pins, and other baubles that catch her eye. The picture includes the immortal line, ‘Beulah, peel me a grape’, a request which inspires micro-level pampering for ambitious sass mouth dames.

Sass Mouth Dames Film Club Series 6

Join me on Wednesdays this autumn for another round of classic woman’s pictures from the Pre-Code era.

Screened in the gorgeous Denzille Cinema in Merrion Square for 19.00, 26 September-24 October.

Soda & snacks included.

Tickets available from Eventbrite.

Night Nurse (1931)

26 September

‘I’m Nick—the chauffer’.

If Clark Gable’s line delivery doesn’t make you gasp the way it does Barbara Stanwyck, you’re probably in the wrong cinema. Stanwyck proves why she’s Queen of the Pre-Codes in this gritty picture about injustice, corruption and the most vicious cruelty. When no one else cares or intervenes, Stanwyck charges the bullies full steam. She can’t go wrong with Joan Blondell on her side. This was the first of five pictures Stanwyck made with director William Wellman. He said of her ‘she not only knew her own lines but everyone else’s. I love her.’

Possessed (1931)

3 October

Joan Crawford works in a paper box factory. She watches the train cars full of glamorous people on their way to New York one night after work, when a stranger in the caboose pours out her first taste of bubbles, and then tells her to run to the big city to be done wrong by. Crawford makes her way to New York and snags the first rich man she encounters—Clark Gable. In a love nest feathered by Gable, she does everything that becomes a lady. Without a wedding ring, society will always regard her as a chippy from the sticks. Joan made life-long fans among women for this tale about double standards and social climbing.

Thirteen Women (1932)

10 October

If only we had the fifteen minutes that were cut from the original picture. No doubt the edited sequences contained additional stylish revenge scenes. Myrna Loy plays a biracial girl who suffered untold misery from the privileged white girls in an exclusive boarding school. She was tormented by her classmates. All grown up, Myrna mesmerises a famed astrologer into sending horoscopes that she designs with the power of suggestion to bring about a series of gruesome tragedies. Irene Dunne plays one of the former pupils who denies the power of the star charts. This is the only horror picture I’ve included in the series so far. Not to be missed.

No Man of Her Own (1932)

17 October

What does a small-town librarian do for fun? Well, if you’re Carole Lombard, you hook up with a random dude (Clark Gable) one night after the library closes and parlay that into wedded bliss. Lombard soon learns what her husband really does for a living, which rocks her to the core. Can she make him go straight? This was the only picture that Lombard and Gable made together. Although their romance did not commence until the Mayfair Ball in 1936, they still generate enough heat to burn down the stacks.

Bombshell (1933)

24 October

Jean Harlow stars in a picture that borrows from Clara Bow’s life story. Beset by moochers who feed stories to the tabloids, Harlow’s character endures the studio’s demanding schedule, while she picks up the tab for a shower of freeloaders. Harlow strips the varnish off the glamour factory and shows viewers the grind behind the glitz. She’s at her snarling-best in this picture. Sass mouth dame all the way.

Sass Mouth Dames Film Club Series 5

Sass Mouth Dames Film Club Series 5 presents four stellar woman’s pictures from 1930-1935 in the lovely Denzille cinema in Dublin, Thursdays, 31 May-21 June.

Tickets available through Eventbrite.

Megan McGurk hosts each classic film.

Soda and snacks are included.

Ladies of Leisure (1930)

Roommates Barbara Stanwyck and Marie Prevost pay the bills with sex work. One night after a narrow escape from a party boat, with smeared mascara and a torn dress, Stanwyck’s character meets a rich man who drives her back into the city. Ralph Graves plays an artist with his own roof top studio. He offers her a job posing for a portrait. Stanwyck assumes that it’s only a matter of time until he proves himself to be after only one thing, like every other man she has met. Despite her misgivings and his society name, she falls for the guy. Things look swell until his mother attempts to thwart the romance. Can Marie Prevost protect her dearest friend from disaster? This is the first of four pictures that Stanwyck made with director Frank Capra.

Dancing Lady (1933)

A huge hit for MGM, this picture has everything. Joan Crawford performs in a burlesque show that’s raided by police for offence against public decency. Franchot Tone (Joan’s future second husband) sees her in court, pays her fine, and takes her out for a bite to eat. Despite the condescending note he sends the next day (along with fifty dollars) to buy a dress without zippers and shoes without bows, in a snobbish appraisal of her current wardrobe, she falls for the rich man. Crawford’s Janie Barlow dreams of a part in a Broadway show. To speed up the process, she stalks Clark Gable, who plays a big-time producer. They enjoy more than a little bit of sexual tension. Crawford and Gable flirt in a scene set in a gym that’s one of the best onscreen seductions. Other highlights include Fred Astaire in his screen debut as Joan’s dancing partner. The Three Stooges join the cast.

The Girl from Missouri (1934)

Anita Loos (mother of all sass mouth dames) wrote the script about a chorine gal-pal team on the hunt for men with deep pockets. Only Jean Harlow could pull off a woman who waits for her wedding night without suggesting a virginity fetish. Harlow’s so over-sexed, clearly gasping for it, that you can’t blame her for waiting until he puts a ring on it. One night after dancing in a club, Harlow and Kelly finagle an invitation to perform for a private party attended by rich men. Harlow’s character puts the moves on a man with considerable assets, who makes a present of some jewelled cufflinks, right before he puts a gun in his mouth. The gals add suspected of murder to the list of their problems. Patsy Kelly steals the show, like always, by playing the wisecracking loyal friend. She also makes up for her friend’s chastity by giving every man she fancies a tumble.

The Devil Is a Woman (1935)

The last of seven pictures Marlene Dietrich made with Josef von Sternberg, this one has the best tone and aesthetic. Marlene is a glorious nut-buster throughout the picture as a woman who works in a tobacco factory and later becomes a sensation singing in nightclubs. Although not technically a Pre-Code, von Sternberg’s picture has all the hallmarks of the era when women could prioritise their own pleasure at the expense of men without suffering consequences. Dietrich fleeces a self-important army captain (Lionel Atwill), while she juggles other men including a bullfighter and a dashing young Cesar Romero. In each scene, Dietrich is dressed by Travis Banton in show-stopper ensembles, with every fabric in creation, embellished with countless veils, fans, gloves, jewellery and accessories. This picture will cure what ails you because it proves that sass mouth dames need take no prisoners.