Getting ready to meet family on New Year's Day,I decided to choose a film we could watch. With this title having sat in the "Must watch" pile for some time, it felt like the perfect moment, for a disgraced viewing.
View on the film:
Gliding up Gay's legs as she shows off the latest fashion, director Erle C. Kenton & Journey Into Fear (1943-also reviewed) cinematographer Karl Struss dress the tale in an immaculate, ultra-stylized fashion of long, gliding dolly shots which contrast the high-end clothes Gay models with her humble surroundings, crane shots displaying the bustling city life, and rapid-fire crash zooms landing on the shaky relationship between Gay and her police officer dad Holloway.
Just one of 32 credits she made, Helen Twelvetrees (who was sadly just 49 when she died from suicide in 1958) gives a sparkling performance as Gay, thanks to Twelvetrees twirling saucy Pre-Code one-liners, with a Melodrama agony, while William Harrigan brings out a fitting gruffness as Holloway tries to help his daughter out of a deadly situation.
Lacing the tale with risque punch-lines, the screenplay by Francis Martin & Alice D. G. Miller sprinkle comedic asides in a playful mix of Melodrama and Crime Pre-Code frolics, as the writers spiral out Gay's light romantic exchanges into a deadly, abrupt outburst of violence, which results in Holloway revealing his tough, fatherly manner, as he tries to save his daughter from disgrace.
View on the film:
Gliding up Gay's legs as she shows off the latest fashion, director Erle C. Kenton & Journey Into Fear (1943-also reviewed) cinematographer Karl Struss dress the tale in an immaculate, ultra-stylized fashion of long, gliding dolly shots which contrast the high-end clothes Gay models with her humble surroundings, crane shots displaying the bustling city life, and rapid-fire crash zooms landing on the shaky relationship between Gay and her police officer dad Holloway.
Just one of 32 credits she made, Helen Twelvetrees (who was sadly just 49 when she died from suicide in 1958) gives a sparkling performance as Gay, thanks to Twelvetrees twirling saucy Pre-Code one-liners, with a Melodrama agony, while William Harrigan brings out a fitting gruffness as Holloway tries to help his daughter out of a deadly situation.
Lacing the tale with risque punch-lines, the screenplay by Francis Martin & Alice D. G. Miller sprinkle comedic asides in a playful mix of Melodrama and Crime Pre-Code frolics, as the writers spiral out Gay's light romantic exchanges into a deadly, abrupt outburst of violence, which results in Holloway revealing his tough, fatherly manner, as he tries to save his daughter from disgrace.