Unashamed could be the title of many pre-Code films and in Beaumont's film it is shown in a number of ways: Joan Ogden (played beautifully by Helen Twelvetrees) is not ashamed when she goes off and spends the night at a hotel with her lover, Harry Swift (Monroe Owsley), after he convinces her that her father (Robert Warwick) will have to let her marry him; if she doesn't get her father's permission then Swift won't get her money. Her father refuses his permission and Joan's brother Dick (Robert Young) shoots and kills Swift. Joan loved Swift and is unashamed to testify against her brother at his trial. After her testimony her brother's lawyer Henry Trask (Lewis Stone) tells Joan that unless she changes her story under cross-examination Dick will go to the electric chair; in other words Trask is suborning perjury. Joan is unashamed to change her story, portraying herself as a slut who doesn't care about marriage, and Dick is aquitted. And because this is a pre-Code film everyone goes free.
In the pre-Code days one could get away with murder and suborning perjury, at the price of a double standard when the woman takes the blame, even if it means that her reputation is forever ruined. The film, of course, makes broad hints that Dick and Joan are incestuously interested in each other -- the first time we see them a fountain is spewing out plumes of water while they are kissing each other on the lips -- and that this is what motivates Joan's change of heart. Beaumont and his veteran cinematographer Norbert Brodine photographs Joan with sexy low-angle shots when she is unrepentant and at eye-level when she changes her story. Unashamed, like many pre-code films, is about class, as Harry Swift's father (Jean Hersholt) pleads with Joan's father not to let Joan marry Swift, whose real name is August Schmidt, because Swift is no good and extorts money from everyone he can. Bayard Veiller's original script emphasizes class differences, while Beaumont's gentle direction finds that everyone has their reasons for what they do, even showing a loving relationship between Swift and his father, in spite of all their differences.
No comments:
Post a Comment