Top 5 Camp Classics!

It's the 60th Anniversary of The Ten Commandments and TCM Big Screen Classics is celebrating by releasing the film in theaters March 20th and 23rd. I'm going to celebrate by including the movie on my Top 5 Camp Classics List!

Camp movies, it might be said, are all in the eye of the beholder. The films included can be everything from drag farce, to epic misfires, to schlocky horror. Not everyone agrees that certain films are camp, and definitions can be a little hazy. But I'm going to take a crack at it anyway.

Successful camp often comes from a film that was produced very seriously- overly so to the point that it feels like "too much." This results in films that are failing so badly at their intended reactions that we find ourselves laughing at them. For me, true camp (with the exception of genre genius John Waters) is not made on purpose. It's the product of a director and/or actors who are not aware how their film is being received by the audience. In other words, camp is one of the most rare of genres because these gems of thwarted expectations are totally accidental.

Here are my Top 5 Camp Classics:

1. The Ten Commandments (1956)

Cecil B. DeMille made EPICS! From as early as the silent era, DeMille made big budget films that included casts of thousands and massive sets- some of which were so large, they were just left in the desert where they were built. DeMille's great ability was to create films that were so extravagant, they had to be seen to be believed. The studios were happy to indulge his cinematic flamboyance because in the '50's, a DeMille film was an event that could compete with the television- the biggest threat to the movie business at that time. And there was no bigger story for DeMille to tell than the story of Moses.

DeMille pulled out all the stops. He spent $13 million dollars on the production (that's $130 mill in today's dollars), shot on location in the Sinai, and a cast a vast army of actors led by: Charlton Heston, Yul Brynner, Anne Baxter, Edward G. Robinson, Yvonne De Carlo, Nina Foch, Cedric Hardwicke, Judith Anderson, and Vincent Price.

One look at the cast, and you can see why this serious epic has become a delightful piece of high camp. It's a who's-who of scenery chewers, each one greater at hamming it up than the next. And the bible-inspired dialogue thuds deliciously off of their tongues.

"You will be king of Egypt, and I will be your footstool!"

"Where's your Moses now?"

"Oh Moses, Moses, why of all men did I fall in love with a prince of fools?"

The lines can't be delivered with a straight face- but they are- desperately so. With its eye-popping costumes, sets, and special effects, the film is like a fabulous biblical theme park- it's so ridiculously gaudy, we can't wait to ride it again and again.
The Ten Commandments was a huge hit at the box office, currently ranking 6th in all-time box office receipts (adjusted for inflation). Ironically, Hollywood wised-up and sold its movies to television, and The Ten Commandments became an Easter staple in living rooms around the country. But nothing beats watching hirsute Chuck Heston part the Red Sea on the big screen.

Oh The Ten Commandments, you stubborn, splendid, adorable fool!

2. Female Trouble (1974)

As mentioned in my intro, John Waters is one of those rare directors who makes camp films on purpose. Much of this stems from The Pope of Trash's desire to poke convention in the eye with a handheld camera. With his muse Divine (Harris Glen Milstead's mascara-ed alter ego) Waters became the king of a whole new genre of underground cinema. His first shot at filthy stardom came with 1972's Pink Flamingos where he shocked viewers with a singing a-hole (no, not Ted Nugent- an actual a-hole that lip-synced)  and Divine eating dog crap on camera. Two years later, Waters applied his special brand of perversity to the story of juvenile delinquent Dawn Davenport (Divine).

From the first moment we see Dawn tramping around the Christmas tree hollering about cha-cha heels we know this girl is no good. So it comes as no surprise that Dawn rebels against marriage and motherhood by becoming a famous murder artist. Along with Divine, Waters' cast of regulars includes Mink Stole as Divine's obnoxiously twitchy daughter Taffy, porcine Edith Massey as the loud-mouthed-crammed-into-her-costume Aunt Ida, and David Lochary and Mary Vivian Pierce as fashionista perverts The Dashers.

Waters has no interest in conforming to film standards in order to tell a story or draw us into a make-believe world. The five cent budget, dialogue improvisation, handheld camerawork, and performers who don't look or act like actors leave the audience not with the idea that we've seen a film- but the most fucked-up home movie ever made. Waters would later clean-up his filmmaking and score a mainstream hit with Hairspray (1988), but I prefer my Waters dirty.

3. Lady in a Cage (1964)

Olivia de Havilland is one of the most memorable actresses of the studio system who starred in such great films as Gone With the Wind (1939), and The Heiress (1949). But by 1964, de Havilland did what many older actresses like Bette David and Joan Crawford did to make a quick buck- she starred in a low-budget horror movie. 

Lady in a Cage starts off with a strange, Saul Bass-esque montage of images- a young black girl rolling her roller skate over a passed out drunk, a dead dog lying in the street, people necking while an evangelist preaches over the radio about an anti-Satan missile. Mrs. Cornelia Hilyard (de Havilland) lives in a house along a busy street. But the calm and quiet of her "looks bigger-on-the-inside" home screens out the noisy outside world. Corny (that's what I like to call her) broke a hip recently and now has to get around with a cane, and an elevator. Yes, you heard right, an elevator.

To go from her bedroom to the living room, Corny has to get into an elevator that feels like it takes 20 minutes to go down one floor. She doesn't mind. She takes along her transistor radio and patiently waits to descend. But today is a bad day for Corny. Her gay son who lives with her has left for the weekend to commit suicide and due to a freak accident with a garbage truck out back, the power to Corny's house is knocked out- while she's suspended over the ground floor in her elevator.

And if that isn't bad enough, a group of drug-addled hippies (led by a young and very hairy James Caan) find out she's trapped and come to rob her home and create general mayhem. The plot is ludicrous, and for a good portion of the film you have to keep yourself from screaming, "JUST JUMP!!!" at the screen- but there's de Havilland. The poise and stature of this regal lady rises above the film and endows it with a gravitas it doesn't truly deserve.

When Corny decides to fight back with a war cry of, "Welcome to the Stone Age!" you abandon all logic and go along with her. I think this film is trying to make a commentary on how the chaos of the Sixties was invading our personal lives- but you'll be too busy watching De Havilland try to knock a phone off the hook with a homemade Grab-It to care.

4. Mommie Dearest (1981)

I have a love/hate relationship with Mommie Dearest. I mean, it's the film that effectively destroyed Joan Crawford's cinematic image forever, and I can't forgive it for that. But God it's fun to watch.

Faye Dunaway stars as Joan Crawford- or at least Dunaway's version of Joan Crawford. In Dunaway's hands, Crawford becomes a glamorous gorgon- a woman who is meticulously in control of everything around her- including her image. Whether she's jogging, putting on elbow cream, or chopping down rose bushes, Dunaway uses the dramatic gestures and voice of an ACTRESS to depict Crawford. Dunaway was obsessed with this role- to the point she felt that Crawford was haunting her. The line between actress and role feels frayed, as if Dunaway didn't just play Crawford but became her.

But is this what Crawford was really like? Even Christina Crawford whose book started this whole mess announced after seeing the movie, "That's not my mother." While Crawford had major difficulty differentiating between public and private, the idea that she was Mildred Pierce behind closed doors is hard to swallow- no matter how enthralling it might be to imagine. Whether Dunaway captures the real Crawford is hardly the point, though. What she does is create a fascinating caricature that is endlessly entertaining in its rejection of reality for grand explosions of love and anger and wire hanger frustration.

This film is a perfect example of accidental camp. The film was released as a serious drama addressing child abuse. But the crowds of gay men cackling at Dunaway's every line soon made it apparent that the audience was seeing it as something else.

5. Valley of the Dolls (1967)

What could possibly happen to three, attractive young women who meet in New York on their way to fame and fortune in the entertainment biz? In the hands of writer Jacqueline Susann, plenty. Based on the wildly successful novel, the film version of Valley of the Dolls follows Anne (Barbara Parkins), Neely (Patty Duke), and Jennifer (the late Sharon Tate) as they attempt to make it in this biz we call show. Successes and failures both professional and private abound and no one makes it out without substance abuse issues.

Along the way Broadway legend Helen Lawson (played by Queen of the scenery-chewers Susan Hayward) stands as a bitchy moral compass, a survivor who turns wig catastrophes into victory laps.

Valley of the Dolls has always been over-the-top, and it is that quality that turns this cinematic soap opera into camp. Over time, the film's desire to shock its audience has only increased that campiness. The sensationalism of drug abuse, sex scandals, homosexuality, and naked pictures turns into laughs as the culture we live in now accepts these aspects of the Hollywood story as de rigeur. The recently reported re-make seems silly to me. What are these girls going to do to shock a modern audience? Get an abortion on live television... on the moon? Part of the joy of this film is the kitsch of the Sixties, that like a fine wine will continue to improve with age. There's no need to make any new bottles of it.

So those are my favorite camp films. What are yours?

The IT Girls

For the next two weeks, Film Forum is hosting a film series called It Girls, Flappers, Jazz Babies and Vamps. It's an amazing collection of movies from an era where women were able to star in roles that showed-off the power of female sexuality. Women played characters with a passion for life, love, and good bathtub gin. This female freedom mirrored the advances women were making politically and socially in this country. Unfortunately, the introduction of the Production Code Administration and the Legion of Decency turned Hollywood movies into a celluloid cage for women. Open sexuality was frowned upon and could only be shown if the woman who displayed it was properly punished by the end of the film. But before 1934, women were able to grab ahold of fast roles and run with it. Here are some of my favorite screen sirens from that era:

Joan Crawford

Most people think of Crawford in her Mildred Pierce (1945) phase where she was all shoulders, eyebrows, and slaps. But Crawford got her start two decades earlier in silent film where she played a definitive flapper, rolling her shoulders and kicking up her heels. The young Crawford's energy is electric and those big eyes shown with an unrestrained love of life. As sound came in she was able to transition to talkies with ease, and also survive the changes of the Code by turning her flapper persona into a girl who comes from nothing and fights her way to the top. You can see the two ends of this evolution by watching Our Dancing Daughters (1928)- the film that made Crawford a superstar and Possessed (1931) where she plays a factory girl who sees a better life with wealthy wheeler and dealer Skeets Gallagher (Clark Gable in his first film-pairing with Crawford.) If you haven't seen this era of Crawford's career, you don't have the full story of this Hollywood icon.

Marlene Dietrich

There has never been a screen image like Marlene Dietrich's. The German sex goddess first came to prominence in 1930's The Blue Angel where she played a heartless cabaret singer who ruins the life of a school professor who falls in love with her. She would continue in her next few films to play chanteuses or prostitutes who left destroyed men in their wakes. Dietrich's beauty is beyond question, but what made her unique was her ability to inhabit the image that was being so carefully sculpted around her by director and lover Josef von Sternberg. Von Sternberg's use of lighting to capture Dietrich's face is genius, and with her sly, sexy glance, Dietrich was able to breathe life into that image. Film Forum is showing two of her best from the beginning of her career: Blonde Venus (1932) (you can't miss the "Hot Voodoo" number) and Shanghai Express (1932) (with the equally sexy Anna Mae Wong).

Barbara Stanwyck 

I love Barbara Stanwyck. No matter what she played- whether it was a golddigger, a blousy mom, or a western matriarch, she always felt so authentic. Stanwyck never appeared to be acting, she just was- and if you didn't like it- you could take a flying leap. Early on she was able to play characters who used that sort of brashness to put a dent in the man's world by any means necessary. Stanwyck is the definitive social climber in Baby Face (1933) and even if the ending was changed, this film still shows off Stanwyck's ability to play a shysteress that we want desperately to get ahead.

Louise Brooks

There are many who consider Louise Brooks to be one of the best actresses of the silent era. What makes Brooks stand out is the naturalness of her acting during an era where naturalness was not a common feature in film performances. Brooks came to Hollywood by way of the celebrated Denishawn dance troupe. Her bob hair cut and impish gaze made her an instant celebrity. But Brooks hated Hollywood. She was easily distracted by life and had no desire to waste her time standing around film sets or playing the Hollywood game to get parts in unremarkable films. So when she got a chance to go to Germany and shoot with the legendary G.W. Pabst, she flipped Hollywood the bird and left. The result is a wonderful silent film that perfectly shows why Brooks was so exciting to watch. Pandora's Box (1929) shows the adventures of a young woman who plays with men (and women) at will, with little care for the repercussions. Brooks would be done with the movies by 1938, but would re-emerge decades later as the poster girl for the Silent Era.

Joan Blondell

Joan Blondell had a fresh mouth. Sure she was a cute blonde who knew how to sing and dance her way into your heart. But it was her ability to deliver the best wisecrack that made her the perfect co-star in movies throughout the '30's. No matter whether she was sharing the screen with Ginger Rogers, Ruby Keeler, or James Cagney, Blondell always walked away with the film. She's a perfect example of the actress that was built for the sound era. A line like "Hello, you great big, beautiful heel!" rolled out of her droll mouth effortlessly- and it made her a joy to watch. Check out two of her most fun musicals at the festival: Goldiggers of 1933 (1933) and Dames (1934).

So, who's your favorite IT girl?

Top 5 Based-on-a-Book Movies

This weekend the venerable old Landmark Loew's Jersey Theatre is showing three classic movies that were based on popular books: The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), Stand by Me (1986), and To Kill a Mockingbird (1962). Great books do not always make great movies. For every Gone With the Wind (1939) you have The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990). Screenplay adapters have to understand what makes a book resonate and translate it to the visual medium of film. Here are five movies that I think got it right- even if they didn't strictly follow the source material:

1.) Mildred Pierce (1945)

Everybody knows how much I adore this movie. Crawford is transcendent (and yes, sympathetic) and gives one of the greatest performances of her career. But interestingly enough, the movie is quite different from the book. Author James M. Cain was already a hit writer when he penned Mildred Pierce in 1941. His previous book The Postman Always Rings Twice and serialized Double Indemnity were both thrillers that swirled around crime and infidelity. Sexy stuff for the mid-Thirties. But Mildred Pierce was not a crime novel. It was a melodrama following the titular Mildred's dissolving first marriage and her struggles to give her daughters all the things she didn't have- resulting in a legendary spoiled brat. So why does the movie version of Mildred Pierce open with Monte Beragon (the slick Zachary Scott) getting filled full of lead?

It would seem that the makers of Mildred Pierce were worried that Cain's previous work and the successful movie version of Double Indemnity a year earlier had created an expectation in the audience for a crime story. Not to mention that violence sells, so why not try and meld together a film noir and a women's film? Enter the crime bookends at the beginning and end of Mildred Pierce.

Director Michael Curtiz did an amazing job weaving together the two genres and cinematographer Ernest Haller creates a wonderful visual juxtaposition between where Mildred began and the dark place she wound up using the contrasting lighting tropes of  noir and melodrama. That genre-blending is one of the reasons Mildred Pierce has stayed with us so long... and there's the slapping scene.

2.) A Clockwork Orange (1971)

Stanley Kubrick has a freak side. Sure, you see an orgy or two in his Eyes Wide Shut (1999), but nothing can top the vicious sexuality on display in A Clockwork Orange. Anthony Burgess' 1962 book that the film is based on was likewise provocative. The tale of Alex and his gang of no-goodniks takes place in a not-to-distant dystopian England where rape and violence proliferate the city's streets, and no one proliferates quite as much as Alex and his droogs. But this book wasn't just radical for its sex and violence. It is also challenging in its stance that the measures society takes to try and fix human behavior could be just as barbaric as the crimes themselves.

The movie version of Clockwork brings Burgess' ideas to startling life through the lens of one of the cinema's greatest visual artists. It's one thing to read about a gang rape. It's another to see it- and it's yet another to see it as if it's a surreal work of art. There are several rape scenes in the film (and one consensual sped-up lovefest) and none of them are filmed realistically. The violence and terror of rape are there, but they are abstracted.

The rape of a girl takes place on an abandoned stage to the strains of Beethoven. The rape of another woman is committed by men in phallic harlequin masks, who cut strategic holes in her pantsuit, all while singing the title tune from Singin' in the Rain'. A feisty older woman is attacked in her cat and erotic art-covered home with an enlarged penis sculpture. Kubrick re-imagines the rapes of Burgess' novel as violent art pieces instead of realistic acts of violence.

In the second half of the film as young Alex pays for his crimes, he is subjected to an experimental behavioral psychology "cure" for criminal thoughts called the Ludovico Technique. Alex is strapped to a chair in a theater, his eyes pried open by some nasty eye clamps, and is subjected to the cruelest images of rape and violence. The treatment works- but leaves poor Alex unable to defend himself in the real world- or to even enjoy his beloved Ludwig Van.

Unpacking a Kubrick film will take much more space and time than this blog can handle- but a good starting point is to think about the link between the distorted images of sex and violence depicted in Kubrick's film, and the more realistic images Alex is subjected to in the theater for his treatment. Kubrick has taken Burgess' material and skillfully applied it to the cinematic medium- making the ideas visual while at the same time confronting the medium presenting those visuals.

And then there's the Clockwork fan who made Alex's bedspread.

3.) Misery (1990)

 As far as I'm concerned, Stephen King is this century's (or is it last century's?) Charles Dickens. The man's consistent stream of fascinating horror books that create unforgettable characters who leap from the page into our nightmares is truly unique in the publishing world. One of my favorites was 1987's Misery. I will never forget reading it in one sitting during a weekend in my snowed-in one-room apartment. I don't recommend reading Stephen King books if your physical environment matches the story's. Just don't.
At the time, most of King's books were made into movies, and Misery was no exception. A mere three years after the book was published, Rob Reiner shot the film version starring James Caan and relative newcomer, Kathy Bates. Caan plays Paul Sheldon, author of a hit romance book series who is tired of selling out.

On a self-imposed writer's exile in Colorado to finish the last book in his Misery Chastain cycle, his car skids off a snowy road and he comes-to broken, but alive in a room in the house of his "number one fan", Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates.) Annie goes from savior to torturer when she discovers the galley of the new book and demands that Paul re-write it so her favorite character doesn't die, or else...

Bates was inspired casting. She so perfectly embodies the homespun schizoid Annie, that you would think it was written for her. Bates is able to balance the lonely outcast with the manic curse-filled psycho to the point we are almost sad that Paul has to dispatch her. She found the dark humor that King had placed in Annie, and  it would earn Bates her first Oscar nom and to date- only win.

King has a thing for people who are stuck or trapped (think Cujo, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, The Shining, The Mist, and Gerald's Game.) In a novel, it gives his main characters time to ruminate on themselves and their lives, as well as figure out a way to get un-trapped, but in a movie, it's a dangerous choice to set a film in one location. Reiner handles the obstacle of the one-room location with a tight, fast script by Oscar-Winner William Goldman that builds tension to scream-worthy levels.

There are occasionally breaths of fresh air as we go outside the room to follow Buster and Virginia (the adorably matched Richard Farnsworth and Frances Sternhagen) as they search for the missing Paul. But mainly, we are trapped in that room with Paul, desperately trying to figure out how to escape, dreading the sound of Annie's key turning in the lock.

4.) The Stepford Wives (1975)

Ira Levin was hot stuff in the late '60's and early '70's. His books Rosemary's Baby (1967) and The Stepford Wives (1972) were hits and the release of the film version of Rosemary's Baby in 1968 was a smash success. Levin tapped into the Women's Movement in this country in a creative way- depicting women who were trapped in supernatural situations that reflected a growing dissatisfaction with traditional marriage. The Stepford Wives addressed Women's Lib and how the male-dominated culture constructed women and their views of themselves.

In the film version, Joanna Eberhart (Katharine Ross) and her family move to a Connecticut town with the hopes of escaping the New York rat race. Everything seems idyllic- too much so. The wives of Stepford are all immaculately dressed, beautifully put together, and willing to make their husbands happy at any cost. Joanna isn't having any of this, and decides with her friend Bobbie (the hilarious Paula Prentiss) to find out what is in the water of Stepford that makes women such lovely doormats.
Not to be a spoiler queen, but it ain't the water that's the problem in Stepford, it's the men.

Critics of the movie (and they include feminist author Betty Freidan) felt that the movie dumbed down feminism and fetishized the image of the perfect woman. I hate to argue with the author of The Feminine Mystique, but she was totally missing the point. The image of the perfect wife in The Stepford Wives isn't attractive. It's terrifying.

The soft-focus perfection and robotic repetition of domestic patter about recipes and household cleaners is unsettling- not appealing. The final scene of the wives of Stepford walking through the supermarket isn't one of tranquil beauty- it is ghastly- almost like a uniformed fascist brigade that is looking for the softest two-ply.

The movie has become a camp classic due to its fashion and outdated vision of femininity- but I think it is a well-made social-issue horror movie- one that uses visuals instead of explicit ideology to spread its terror. And I think in a world where many women become more and more plastic, there is something to be learned in a movie about a town full of synthetic women.

5.) Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)

Ah, Breakfast at Tiffany's- one of the great romance films from the end of the studio era where a carefree fashionista and an earnest writer fall in love living in the same New York apartment building. But if the movie had been made more faithful to Truman Capote's 1958 novella, it would have looked quite different. To begin with, Capote's main characters were a little rougher than their cinematic counterparts. In the novel, Holly Golightly is not a lovable pixie who gets through life having men give her money for the powder room. She's a hooker. Unrepentantly so. She has a foul mouth and admits to sleeping with men and women. This has little effect on neighbor Paul Varjack's interest in her, though, because in the book, Paul is a gay man.

A literary stand-in for Capote, Paul is fascinated by Holly, but has no intention of  marrying her. So it should come as no surprise that the rainy happy ending with Cat reunited with the two lovers doesn't exist in the book. In the book Holly and Paul part ways- and Cat disappears. And the wonderful character of "2E" Failenson that Patricia Neal has such delicious fun with doesn't even exist. There is a Mr. Yunioshi in the book but he is played by a real Japanese man.

So why all the changes? Simple. It was 1961. There was no way a movie could be made about a bisexual prostitute and her gay friend. The Production Code was beginning to wane- but not that much. The language in the book alone wouldn't be seen on American movie screens for another eight or nine years. So director Blake Edwards took a darkly funny story, removed the questionable parts, and made it more funny funny by throwing in a charming romance and Mickey Rooney in yellow-face (a funny fail). But the film does retain some of the sad undercurrent from the book with Audrey Hepburn's sensitive portrayal of a lost girl and Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer's unforgettable Best Song Oscar-Winner "Moon River."

What "book-to-movie" films do you love?

The Big Screen in the Sky: Ken Adam

Oscar-winning production designer Ken Adam has passed away at age 95. While his name might not ring any bells, his work certainly will. Adam was the production designer for the early Bond films including Dr. No (1962), Goldfinger (1964), and You Only Live Twice (1967). And every kid of a certain age will appreciate his work on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968.)

Adam joined the ranks of legendary designers when he designed the famous war room set for Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove (1964), and would later win an Oscar for his work on Kubrick's 18th Century drama, Barry Lyndon (1975). Adam's sets were integral to the films he worked on, and he should be remembered in the same breath with the famous directors he worked with to bring such memorable visions to the screen.

Black Films Matter!

With all the talk this year about lily-white Hollywood, Anthology Film Archives is finishing up their American International Festival with eight Blaxpoitation Films that really go back to black. Now whether you feel that these films from the Seventies celebrate Black Power or stereotype and fetishize it, these films are amazing time capsules of a culture that was struggling with racial issues through its entertainments.

Made on the cheap and full of sex, violence, and outlandish fashions these films were created specifically for a black audience. Some of the first films of this genre were made by black directors like Melvin Van Peebles (whose film Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971) you can see at BAM next Wednesday 3/16)  and Gordon Parks who worked within the white film system to provide new cinematic images of Black Culture.

But once those films showed they could make money, Hollywood caught-on and started making Blaxpoitation films as well- with white directors. So the genre can lurch from strong images of black men and women subverting the sytem to chicks pulling each others' afros with their hoo-has out.

Either way, the films are a fun watch and start Friday 3/11. I would recommend catching the deep-voiced William Marshall in Blacula (1972) and the always entertaining Pam Grier in Coffy (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974).

For a really great documentary on Blaxpoitation films, check out Baadasssss Cinema (2002).

Catch you on the flipside!

These Movies Are Condemned!

The Catholic Legion of Decency.
No, CLOD is not from a Monty Python sketch. Nor is it a clandestine group of super-villains from a Venture Brothers episode.
Founded in 1933, the organization was the moral police for Hollywood, ushering in the Production Code Era. Before 1933, Hollywood studios paid lip service to religious organizations who were upset with the morals of Tinseltown and the degenerate films it produced. (Their word, not mine.) The movie moguls knew that sex and violence sold tickets so they saw no reason to change their business plans, but they needed to appease the shrill moralists who could organize boycotts of films. In 1930, they propped-up an ex-Postmaster General (Will H. Hayes), had him come up with a strict list of Don'ts and Be Carefuls that they publicly said they would honor, and went merrily about their way making movies full of sex and violence.

This gambit worked for a couple years but religious leaders like the Archbishop of Cincinnati finally felt that enough was enough and organized the Legion of Decency to force Hollywood to clean up its act. While its mission statement was to provide a ratings system to alert their parishioners to movies that were "immoral", the more effective purpose was to organize boycotts of films the Legion deemed unfit for human consumption. The threat of well-organized boycotts by Catholics in the larger urban centers where most theaters made their money was enough to finally force the hand of Hollywood producers.

They created the Production Code Administration under the helm of super-Catholic Joseph I. Breen, or as I like to call him, JIB. The Administration would be given the authority to oversee the moviemaking process from script to final-cut and "suggest" edits based on the Production Code's strict guidelines. And by suggest, I mean that if you didn't do what JIB said, you would not get a PCA Seal of Approval and theaters would not release your film for fear of reprisals from the Legion. This meant that from 1934 on, movies had to punish wrongdoers, not show a toilet, keep the romance out of the bedroom, make sure women's bits were covered tastefully, and forget any depiction of homosexuality.
What a bore, right?

Of course creative filmmakers were quickly able to find ways around the code, using visual shorthand like fade-outs after kissing, eye-matches, and clues that someone "smelled of lavender" to still give their savvy audience members the verboten thrills they craved. These clever end-runs helped create the Hollywood style that would dominate the movies from the '30's until the Code was replaced by the MPAA ratings system in 1968. And we owe it all to the goody-goodies of the Legion of Decency.

Turner Classic Movies is having some fun this Lent by showing films that either helped bring on the Code or caused a stir with the Legion after the code was implemented. They're calling it Condemned and you can go to their oddly designed website to see a list of the movies they are showing.

My picks?

 The Story of Temple Drake (1933)- Based on the William Faulkner novel Sanctuary, Temple Drake would be a difficult movie to make even today. Temple (Miriam Hopkins) is the daughter of a prominent Southern judge and she likes to live fast with booze and boys.

One stormy night she accidentally winds-up held hostage by a rough bootlegger (luggy Jack La Rue) who kills her escort and rapes her. If that's not bad enough, when he heads to the big city he takes Temple with him. But is Temple being held against her will- or has she got a bad case of Stockholm syndrome- or Bad Boy-itis? It's a complicated story that goes to the edge with issues of rape and female sexuality. This is one of those "degenerate" movies whose content inspired the creation of the Legion.

Black Narcissus (1947)- What could the Legion have found objectionable in a movie about a group of nuns living in a monastery in the Himalayas? Plenty. The Powell and Pressburger classic has a palpable sexual undertone with looks flying between Sister Superior (the always wonderful Deborah Kerr) and Mr. Dean (the well-legged David Farrar) which makes Sister Ruth (creepy, creepy Kathleen Bryon) literally go mad with jealousy. As with all Powell and Pressburger films, the Technicolor palate and settings are visually lush and the tense ending is worth the wait. Unfortunately flashback scenes to when Kerr wasn't a nun were cut out of the American release to appease the Legion.

The Outlaw (1943)- This is the movie that made Jane Russell's ta-tas stars. This story of Jesse James with some feminine license taken with history was originally shot by gazillionaire film producer and aviation wunderkind Howard Hughes in 1941. But Russell's low-cut blouses caused so much trouble with the PCA that the film wasn't released widely until 1946. By then the film was so notorious that it sold bonkers tickets and launched Russell's career as a no nonsense actress and cross-your-heart bra pitchperson.

Baby Face (1933)- This is one of my favorite Pre-Code films. Barbara Stanwyck is an un-apologetic social climber who goes from her father's speakeasy to extravagant New York penthouse by using her feminine charms. Along the way there are broken engagements, blackmail, and murder, but Stanwyck always manages to survive. Stanwyck is young and vital here- and so down-to-earth that you hardly blame her for all her misdeeds. She is the product of a rotten world and just does the best she can to survive in it. The ending for this film was re-shot because the New York State Censorship Board had a cow, but much of the naughtiness is left intact with lascivious looks, sex-charged-banter, and camera movement that perfectly visualizes Stanwyck's climb up the corporate ladder. A must-see.

Baby Doll (1956)- This movie is weird- but worth a look. Elia Kazan and Tennessee Williams re-teamed to film the story of Southerner Archie Leigh Meighan (a drawling Karl Malden) who marries a 17-year-old (also drawling Carroll Baker) who coos like a child, sleeps in a nursery crib, and dresses like Jon Benet. It's bad enough that Archie is still waiting to consummate his marriage but along comes an Italian slickster (swarthy-toned Eli Wallach) who has his own ideas about Baby Doll. One look at the trailer and you can guess why the Legion lost their minds. Somehow this film got four Oscar noms- I'm assuming because the Academy figured if it was Kazan, it had to be Oscar-worthy. Eh...

Strange Cargo (1940)- I really like this movie. The final pairing of Crawford and Gable, this strange film is a hybrid of prison escape film, romance, and religious allegory. Verne (Gable) is a prisoner in a French penal colony and Julie (Crawford) is a lady of the night who wants to get back to the mainland and start over. They meet cute on a dock, and when Verne and some fellow prisoners plot an escape, Verne takes Julie along. The intrepid band fights their way through jungles, swamps, and an ocean crossing to find freedom.

One of the escapees, Bible-quoting Cambreau (Ian Hunter) is a calming spiritual influence and seems to know what will happen before it does. Is Cambreau a man, or the Son of you-know-who? The Legion was not too happy about this thinly-veiled depiction of Christ, and Julie's "vocation", so edits were made. Luckily the sparks between Crawford and Gable are impossible to dull, and their electric banter is a reminder of why these two were paired so often on the screen- and why they maintained a long-standing affair off-screen.

So tune into TCM and piss off the Legion by watching some "immoral" movies!