Jean Harlow Red Headed Women Do It Again I Like It
Media Note
If you're interested, I guest starred on the Forgotten Filmcast discussing this motion picture. Click on the flick to check information technology out!
The Particulars of the Picture
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| Lillian, AKA "Red" … Jean Harlow | Emerge … Una Merkel | Bill … Cheter Morris |
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| C.B. Gaerste … Henry Stephenson | Irene … Leila Hyams | Albert … Charles Boyer |
Carmine-Headed Adult female: Found a Fool Lyin' in a Daze
I reviewed a trivial film called Female a week or so agone and was fairly disappointed when it went from the fascinating character study of a woman consumed with power to a schlock romantic drama in the space of a few uncharacteristic scenes.
Now I have Red Headed Woman which has no such noble goals. All of the women contained are either shallow, stupid, or so manipulative, while all the men are helpless bores. And while there's a lot to be said for nobility, where the Pre-Code films shine is in the arena of tantalizing and vivacious debauchery, usual with a squeamish tidy moral to send the audience home with.
Simply, hell, Ruddy Headed Adult female doesn't even take that!
No, Red Headed Woman is the story of Lilian Andrews, an aggressive career girl– but only if you count nailing the dominate'southward married son every bit a career. She's played by Jean Harlow, and actress with the minimum amount of eyebrows and the maximum amount of goofy madness. Every bit a operation barely a step or two beneath the 'army camp' level, Harlow is so ferociously bent on getting a man with money that she careens through the film similar a force of nature.
This is specially bad news for Chester Morris, playing William Legendre. He's a manager at his begetter'due south bank and happily married to a childhood sweetheart when Lilian comes knocking ane evening with his mail service. He resists her modestly at first, but as presently as he sees his picture attached to her garter, all of that politeness and propriety just flies out… well, his fly.
His wife, Irene, gets home from her trip early and finds them engaging in less than moral behavior and the residue of the pic chronicle's Lilian's manipulation of Morris into marriage and gild, merely to be increasingly distressed that no one seems to similar her very much. Harlow plays Lilian every bit a harpy of the highest caliber who always has a weakened sob in reserve in example someone calls her bluff.
Chester Morris, every bit yous probably don't call up, has a way with playing jerks in the early 30'south; he was as well the philandering married man from The Divorcee, though here he's much less of a tragic effigy and more of a henpecked idiot. There's no sadness every bit you watch his marriage dissolve– he'south so smitten (a prissy word for "superhorny") and Irene is and so banal that you never experience for her, fifty-fifty equally Lilian is throwing a hissy fit in her face.
No, the pleasure in Ruddy Headed Adult female all come up from Harlow'due south histrionics. She's electrical in every scene, a forcefulness of nature beyond reasoning. Combine this performance with atmosphere that the Pre-Code films excel in, a beautiful range of the seedy and the glamorous, and you have something that seems trashy but also strangely sweet.
Of course, that'southward until the film delves into what can best exist described as Blue Velvet territory for a chip, equally Harlow takes love in any physical form she can, even when it involves a barbarous beating from an emotionally destroyed Morris. He begins to beat her, and she screams, "Practise information technology once more! I similar it!"
The picture somehow has a happy catastrophe for all involved, and while Red Headed Woman doesn't try to do much as well foreshadow Sid and Nancy past about four decades. While something like Female remains a fascinating failure, Red Headed Woman is a truthful triumph of hysterical love in all of its sick forms.
Proof That It's Pre-Code
- Besides the many opportunities the film takes with showing off Jean Harlow's svelte frame, there'southward an extended sequence where Jean Harlow and Una Merkel exchange wear, which may include a brief shot of Jean Harlow'southward upper lady bits. O_o
- The sequence in which Bill beats Lillian featherbrained… probably would be a no-go afterwards the code.
- Gilded digging is always a big theme during the Pre-Lawmaking era, and this has it in earnest.
- And the ease in which different characters are divorced and the obviousness of these characters sex lives are indulged in makes information technology specially scandalous.
Gallery
Here are some extra screenshots I took. Click on whatever flick to overstate!
Awards, Accolades & Availability
- A more in-depth discussion of this moving-picture show is available in first effect of The Pre-Code Companion. You lot can too see other available issues and topics covered in the series past clicking here or on the banner below.
- This film is bachelor as part of the get-go Forbidden Hollywood Collection via Amazon and tin can be rented from Classicflix. It is also streaming in high definition on Warner Archive Instant video.
Source: https://pre-code.com/red-headed-woman-1932/
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