Back Pay

A reviewer has said "Back Pay is Griffith's only surviving talkie so it's impossible to tell if she was playing a part or if her voice was really her voice." I would like to answer that. In the late '70s I was at a film event that had King Vidor as a guest of honor (at least I think it was him, to the best of my memory). Mr. Vidor (or whoever it was) said that Corrine Griffith wasn't successful in talking films, "because she had a southern accent, and so it was good-bye Corrine!" That part I remember distinctly. This would indicate to me, that the voice in the film is really hers, and that is how she actually talked. As to the opening scene, I get the impression they have her singing "They Didn't Believe Me" in order to establish the period in which the story was supposed to be. That song was a huge hit during the teens and 1930 audiences certainly would have understood the time frame by that--since the clothes don't give anyone a clue. Finally I would like to say that no matter how good or bad the film is--any time we have a talking film of a silent star, it is priceless in the sense that we can know what they sound like. I think of how Mabel Normand and Fatty Arbuckle made so many pictures together. Fatty made several shorts in the 1930s just before he died, so we can know what he sounded like. Mabel never did make any talkies, and so we don't know how she sounded. Now someone might say, "Well who cares how they sounded?" Well, I like to know what people sound like, don't you? I think that's just natural curiosity and it's nice when it can be satisfied.

...but for the rest of you out there seeking pure entertainment I'd pass on this one. Every single star of the four I give it are for the chance to observe in one 50 minute film almost everything that went wrong with early talking pictures - that is, when things did go wrong. You can't learn this stuff by watching "Singin in the Rain" folks.

The film opens in an interesting fashion with Ms. Griffith singing a nifty little ballad entitled "They'll Never Believe Me" wearing a dress and head gear with so many bows she looks like a Christmas present, but it's downhill from there. The story is that of your basic fallen woman (Corinne Griffith as Hester Bevins) and how she fell and why she chooses to remain fallen and if and why she is ever redeemed. Hester is a clerk in a small town department store in Demopolis, Virginia who is loved by Gerald (Grant Withers), the department store bookkeeper. She is apparently subject to ridicule by the other members of the town and she lives on the wrong side of the tracks - literally. She goes home to her aunt's boarding house one day, sees her aunt in her dingy kimono entertaining some man whom she calls "The Boss" - who this guy is exactly is one of many things never explained - looks at the kitchen full of dirty dishes and walls splattered with food and sees her future, and she does not like the view. She high-tails it out of town with nothing but her hat and the clothes on her back accompanied by a splashy traveling salesman who takes her to New York. She immediately trades up from the salesman to being the mistress of wealthy Charles Wheeler (Montagu Love), and from there I'll let you watch and see what happens.

Everyone reviewing here is very hard on Ms. Griffith, but to be honest every single player in this production is acting like they are reciting lines from a high school play. Everyone, that is, with the exception of Louise Beavers who is the only performer in the film who acts like they have a pulse and an idea of who their character is supposed to be. Then there is Grant Withers who I actually liked in a couple of the early WB precodes with his snappy delivery, but here he is saddled with a ridiculous blonde wig and gee whiz dialogue that makes him seem like a twelve year old in a grown man's body.

As for the art design, forget about it. The movie opens in the year 1913 or 1914 - not exactly sure which - yet everybody is dressed like it is 1930 through the whole film, including the women wearing dresses that partially show their knees which would have gotten you arrested at the time. When the film opens everyone is driving horse drawn carriages, but by four years later - 1917 - when Hester revisits her hometown of Demopolis with her New York gang, they are driving Model A's, which weren't' even produced until 1927. And yes, I freeze-framed the film and looked it up.

The title cards would have you believe Hester is living a most debauched life with hammy sentences like "while some lay down their lives others laid down their honor" but other than her being the mistress of a rich man and partaking of some light Prohibition era drinking, I can't see anything wild going on here. Believe me, the so called "party scenes" would put that master of cinematic orgies, Cecil B. DeMille, fast to sleep.

I'd like to lay this entire mess at the feet of the director, but, alas, there is no director to blame! There is no director listed in the credits of the film and this database has William Seiter listed as only the uncredited director. I don't blame him. I wouldn't want my name associated with this either.

If you like film history, then you know that there is no such thing as bad film history, and I advise you watch this film for all the reasons I've given. I'd certainly like to know what Jack Warner thought when he saw it.

Corinne Griffith was a big star in silent films. She made a handful of late silents with talking sequences and then two all-talking films. Both bombed. In 1932 she made a last stab at talkies in an English film and it bombed too.

Back Pay was Griffith's last Hollywood film. It's based on a Fannie Hurst novel and should have been a showcase for her talents as an actress, but the 55-minute film seems a mangle from the beginning. Directed by William Seiter, Back Pay never seems to settle. It's so obviously set in 1930 (clothes, cars, songs, decor) but pretends to be pre-WW I.

Griffith plays a hick from Demopolis, VA who works in a department store. She's in love with a fellow worker (Grant Withers) but yearns for more. She exits on a train out of town. Next scene has her in New York City as a rich man's girlfriend. She has lost the hick accent and is wearing expensive clothing. The lover (Montagu Love) seems nice man and gives her whatever she wants.

She and her friends decide to motor to Hot Springs, a mere 30 miles from Demopolis. Griffith gets a yen to seen the old town and runs into Withers. They chat and she is amazed how good the old town looks. Next scene takes us to Lake Placid where a wistful Griffith is still thinking about Withers.

Back in the city she gets of rush a emotion when WW-I soldiers are marching away to war. Next we see Withers get gassed on a battlefield. Blind and dying from gas poisoning Griffith visits him, gets another rush of emotion, and marries him when she learns he has but weeks to live.

Withers dies on Amistice Day and Griffith is a better woman for it all and even refuses to go back to her old life as a mistress. The End.

Back Pay is Griffith's only surviving talkie so it's impossible to tell if she was playing a part of if her voice (think Zasu Pitts) was really her voice. In any case she comes across very badly. Withers is even worse.

Montagu Love is fine as is Louise Beavers (as the maid), but everyone else is just dreadful. Vivien Oakland (the friend), Hallam Cooley (the traveling salesman), Louise Carver (the masseuse), Virginia Sale (the secretary), and Geneva Mitchell (Babe) are all bad.

But let's blame the director. The film is hideously directed and paced, and the editing is terrible, Was this cut to shreds at some point? Does that explain the abrupt transitions? Seems doubtful. There are so many anachronisms it's hard to believe this was a better film but badly edited.

Griffith was excellent in the few silent films I've seen her in (The Divine Lady, Garden of Allah) and by the end of the silent period was a huge star. She even supposedly won an Oscar nomination for The Divine Lady--a fact inconsistently reported in Oscar histories. But she is not very good in Back Pay.

Griffith is another silent star whose birth year varies widely in different various sources, anywhere from 1894 to 1898. Her first film was in 1916 so she could well have been born in 1898, but if she was born in 1894 she would have been 36 when she made Back Pay--way too old for the part of Hester.

Well no matter. Griffith was a great star in the 1920s--the Orchid Lady--and rivaled Gloria Swanson, Lillian Gish, Greta Garbo, and Mary Pickford in popularity. She was often compared to Norma Talmadge for the kinds of roles she played. And, ironically, like Miss Talmadge, faded from the screen after only a few attempts at talkies.

To be fair Corinne Griffith should be remembered for her great film successes during the silent era and not for the few misguided talkies she attempted. Note: Griffith's memoir became the hit film, Papa's Delicate Condition, in 1963. Griffith appeared in more than 65 films and produced a dozen.

A rare talkie for silent film legend Corinne Griffith (and the only one of her sound films that gets any circulation today), BACK PAY is an agreeable soap opera about a dreamy small town girl Hester Bevins (Griffith) who loves her unambitious but decent local boy but she knows There's A Big World Out There. The ward of her slovenly aunt who owns a run-down boarding house, she impulsively abandons the sticks when a traveling salesman proposes to take her to the big city. Beautiful Hester practically overnight becomes a rich man's mistress but has she really pulled out her small-town roots or gotten over the boy back home? This little movie has received some harsh reviews by some IMDb posters but I felt it was acceptable very early talkie. Griffith is a vision although she was nearing the end of her days as a screen star after over a decade of top stardom. Her speaking voice is quite pleasant if unmemorable. She sings the song "They'll Never Believe Me" in a lovely moment with beau Grant Withers leaning against a tree that opens the film. There are a few brief moments where the naturally refined Hester's clashing with the crude world of low-income South are brilliantly captured, Corinne and Grant's romantic interlude interrupted by the loud, gossipy sarcasm of their boorish friends ("little people, little lives eeewww" Corinne hisses in disgust), and slightly later walking home in a romantic daze and brought sharply down to earth by her vulgar gum-chewing aunt ("always in that filthy pink kimono"), a leering boarder, and most vividly, a sink full of long unwashed dishes and discarded beer bottles that all would have turned Pollyanna into an advocate of the primrose path as it does Hester.

Back Pay (1930)

** (out of 4)

Watching this early talkie makes it easy to understand why Corinne Griffith's sound career really didn't take off. This here would turn out to be her next to last film (before making one more nearly three decades later) and with material like this it's no wonder she stepped aside. In the film she plays Hester Bevins, a small town girl who is loved by Gerald (Grant Withers) but she turns down his proposal because he'll never make much money. Hester runs off to New York City where she gets involved with various rich men but when Gerald goes off to war everything changes. BACK PAY is a really, really bad film on many levels but I must admit that it kept me totally entertained because you never really knew where it was going to go. I should say that the film is 100% predictable so in that way it's not hard to see where it's going. What's so strange is that the film just goes off in various directions and some that you won't see coming. Just check out the first minute when the film starts off with Griffith singing a really bad song and this here tells you things are going to get crazy. The story itself is pretty predictable but it's also hard to figure out. It seems like stuff just happens for no reason at all including Gerald going off to the war, which has apparently been going on for a while yet it's never mentioned in the film until his broken heart goes. The ending, which is meant to be powerful, is so poorly done that it actually had me laughing harder than most of the comedies I've seen from this period. Griffith actually isn't too bad in her role but the screenplay simply gives her nothing to do. Withers, on the other hand, isn't suited for the role here and comes off pretty bad at times. BACK PAY is a film that most people are truly going to hate but I think fans of Griffith will want to check it out as well as those who enjoy bad movies. I will say that the 56-minute running time flew by, which I'm very thankful for.