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Baby Face (1933)
Directed by Alfred E. Green
I remember someone who was quite a player in his heyday. He left a trail of broken hearts, just moving on after getting bored with his latest flavour of the month or when the girlfriend becomes too clingy. The next thing I heard, after a few years, was of him being hospitalised after a suicide attempt. Apparently, one of the girlfriends he fell head over heels for rejected his advances. The affairs of the heart are sometimes difficult to predict.
Trainees, in those days, were expected to manage all patients in the ward and to rattle off their treatment regimens and latest investigation results at the drop of a hat. Failure to do so will invite verbal and personal abuse from the seniors, all in the name of excellent patient care. In every batch, there would be repeat offenders who would not live up to the mark. Somehow, they would get away with murder, using all of their God-endowed assets. Watching this pre-Code movie rekindled those old thoughts.
Pre-Code movies refer to Hollywood's post-sound movies in the 1920s and the period when strict censorship was enforced in 1934. The Hays Code was deemed necessary to curb the portrayal of crime, sex, and sexual manipulation in a positive light and as rewarding. As with this movie, many filmmakers had to change storylines or dialogue to conform to the Code.
Looking through today's lens, the story may be construed as a feminist rebel yell. But then, maybe not, as here we see female empowerment is seen to be abused to fulfil personal agendas. We also see Nietzsche's text manipulated to justify the heroine's shenanigans through his fictitious book titled 'Thoughts For A Reason'. Nietzsche had always said in the book, "face life as you find it - defiantly and unafraid. Waste no time yearning for the moon. Crush out all sentiments".
Barbara Stanwyck, who was praised for her performance here, plays Lily, a hostess and escort at the abusive father's bootleg bar. The characters who end up are mainly uncouth gangsters and lowbrow members of society. The story seems to suggest the father may have abused her and even encouraged her daughter to cosy up with an important client. A fire destroys the joint and kills her father.
Lily and her servant/confidante were at a crossroads. A cobbler, a frequent visitor of the pub, advises her to migrate to New York to build a good life for herself. That is when she starts holding the bull by its horns. Using her physical charm and feminine prowess, she manipulates men to climb the proverbial corporate ladder at a bank, leaving a trail of broken hearts in succession. The series of boyfriends grows more affluent and powerful over time.
The screened version showed Lily as remorseful and content to start over from the bottom. This type of poetic justice is not seen in the original, uncensored cut (restored in 2004) version. It exposes a significantly more uncompromising view of male hypocrisy and female agency.
P.S. Nope, this movie is not about the life and times of America's notorious bank robber, Baby Face Nelson.
P.P.S. Another Nietzschean quote in the movie is 'you must be a master, not a slave. Exploit yourself.
Farouk Gulsara (asokansham@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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