☆ ☆ ½
Call
Her Savage (1932) – J. F. Dillon
After a number of sex scandals and high
profile court cases knocked her out of the public eye, Clara Bow attempted a
comeback with this talkie film. Referred
to as “pre-code” because it was produced before the infamous Hays Code was
brought in to mandate decency, happy endings, and good morals (the villain
always gets punished in the end). Here,
however, there are numerous transgressions of good taste and acceptable
conduct. For one, Clara doesn’t wear a
bra. Beyond that, there is at least one
good cat-fight, some inter-racial romance, a gay bar, and desperate
prostitution. There is also some high
melodrama (Clara’s baby dies in a fire).
But none of this seems to change the pace of the movie, which is spoken
as though every line was a potential one-liner (with a delay for the laugh,
which isn’t warranted in most cases).
So, it just feels a bit odd and unusual, which may have been typical for
films in 1932, as sound was just getting established. A curiosity but no more.
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