103-470: Chickens Come Home is a 1931 American pre-Code short film starring Laurel and Hardy , directed by James W. Horne and produced by Hal Roach . It was shot in January 1931 and released on February 21, 1931. It is a remake of the 1927 silent film Love 'em and Weep in which James Finlayson plays Hardy's role and Hardy plays a party guest. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy assume the roles of proprietors in
206-457: A World War I veteran cast onto the streets with a morphine addiction from his hospital stay. In Wild Boys of the Road (1933), the young man played by Frankie Darrow leads a group of dispossessed juvenile drifters who frequently brawl with the police. Such gangs were common; around 250,000 youths traveled the country by hopping trains or hitchhiking in search of better economic circumstances in
309-486: A chorus girl , she regularly received diamonds and pearls as gifts, but now must content herself with a corned beef sandwich. In Union Depot (1932), Douglas Fairbanks Jr. puts a luscious meal as the first order of business on his itinerary after coming into money. Given the social circumstances, politically oriented social problem films ridiculed politicians and portrayed them as incompetent bumblers, scoundrels, and liars. In The Dark Horse (1932), Warren William
412-588: A building named after himself that is larger than the Empire State Building . He tricks everyone he knows into poverty to appropriate others' wealth. He is ultimately shot by his secretary ( Verree Teasdale ), who then ends the film and her own life by walking off the roof of the skyscraper. Americans' mistrust and dislike of lawyers was a frequent topic of dissection in social problem films such Lawyer Man (1933), State's Attorney , and The Mouthpiece (1932). In films such as Paid (1930),
515-496: A cablegram to all the studios in March 1934 mandating that Dillinger not be portrayed in any motion picture. The genre entered a new level following the release of Little Caesar (1931), which featured Edward G. Robinson as gangster Rico Bandello. Caesar , along with The Public Enemy (starring James Cagney ) and Scarface (1932) (starring Paul Muni ), were, by standards of the time, incredibly violent films that created
618-674: A censorship board in 1921. Virginia followed suit the next year, and eight individual states had a board by the advent of sound film. Many of these boards were ineffectual. By the 1920s, the New York stage, a frequent source of subsequent screen material, had topless shows; performances were filled with profanity, mature subject matter, and sexually suggestive dialogue. Early during the sound system conversion process, it became apparent that what might be acceptable in New York would not be so in Kansas. In 1927, Hays suggested studio executives form
721-429: A committee to discuss film censorship. Irving Thalberg of Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM), Sol Wurtzel of Fox , and E. H. Allen of Paramount responded by collaborating on a list they called the " Don'ts and Be Carefuls ", based on items that were challenged by local censor boards, and which consisted of eleven subjects best avoided, and twenty-six to be handled very carefully. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) approved
824-623: A dispossessed juvenile delinquent is in court expecting a jail sentence. However the judge lets the boy go free, revealing to him the symbol of the New Deal behind his desk, and tells him "[t]hings are going to be better here now, not only here in New York, but all over the country." A box-office casualty of this hopefulness was Gabriel Over the White House , which entered production during the Hoover era malaise and sought to capitalize on it. By
927-495: A dramatic turn when Ollie is confronted in his office by a former flame, portrayed by Mae Busch, who threatens to disclose an incriminating photograph unless financially compensated. Subsequent events unfold with comedic intricacy, as Ollie maneuvers to conceal the woman from his wife who arrives to remind him of their impending dinner party. A fur coat, belonging to the blackmailer, becomes a central object of deception, with Ollie fabricating an explanation to deflect suspicion. Facing
1030-488: A foreword and postscript moralizing on the gangster as a menace to the public welfare." A theatre in Times Square ran The Public Enemy 24 hours a day during its initial release. At the 4th Academy Awards , the film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Story , losing to The Dawn Patrol . In 1989, an animatronics version of a scene from The Public Enemy was incorporated into The Great Movie Ride at
1133-415: A fur warehouse robbery, assuring them he will take care of them if anything goes wrong. When Tom is startled by a stuffed bear, he shoots it, alerting the police, who kill gang member Larry Dalton. When they go to Putty Nose for help, they find he has fled. Tom's straitlaced older brother Mike Powers tries and fails to talk Tom into giving up crime. Tom keeps his activities secret from his doting mother. When
SECTION 10
#17327918636461236-425: A grapefruit for breakfast, he always wanted to put the grapefruit into her face just to get a reaction out of her, so she would show some emotion; he felt that this scene gave him the opportunity to rid himself of that temptation. Some, such as film critic Ben Mankiewicz , have asserted that Mae Clarke's surprised and seemingly somewhat angry reaction to the grapefruit was genuine, as she had not been told to expect
1339-500: A high and self-sufficing purpose. Hays and others, such as Samuel Goldwyn , obviously felt that motion pictures presented a form of escapism that served a palliative effect on American moviegoers. Goldwyn had coined the famous dictum, "If you want to send a message, call Western Union " in the pre-Code era. However, the MPPDA took the opposite stance when questioned about certain so-called "message" films before Congress in 1932, claiming
1442-407: A horse-riding accident, prompting Tom to buy the horse and shoot it. A rival gang headed by "Schemer" Burns takes advantage of the disarray resulting from Nathan's death, precipitating a gang war. Later, Matt is gunned down in public, with Tom narrowly escaping the same fate. Furious, Tom takes it upon himself to single-handedly settle scores with Burns and some of his men. Tom is seriously wounded in
1545-567: A knock on the door, Tom's tied-up body is propped against it, and he falls dead onto the floor. The film closes with Mike walking slowly towards the camera. Uncredited: The screenplay, which was written by Harvey F. Thew, was based on an unpublished novel, Beer and Blood , by John Bright and Kubec Glasmon . Bright and Glasmon based their novel on actual people, having witnessed some of Al Capone 's murderous gang rivalries in Chicago . Warner Bros. studio head Jack L. Warner bought
1648-448: A lot further than more recent efforts such as Wall Street , and it's amazing how much plot and character are gracefully shoehorned into 75 minutes." The film featured pre-Code megastar Warren William (later dubbed "the king of Pre-Code" ), "at his magnetic worst", playing a particularly vile and heartless department store manager who, for example, terminates the jobs of two long-standing male employees, one of whom takes his own life as
1751-651: A memory." Although the liberalization of sexuality in American film had increased during the 1920s, the pre-Code era is either dated generally to the start of the sound film era, or more specifically to March 1930, when the Hays Code was first written. Over the protests of NAMPI, New York became the first state to take advantage of the Supreme Court's 1915 decision in Mutual Film vs. Ohio by instituting
1854-436: A new type of anti-hero. Nine gangster films were released in 1930, 26 in 1931, 28 in 1932 and 15 in 1933, when the genre's popularity began to subside after the end of Prohibition . The backlash against gangster films was swift. In 1931, Jack Warner announced that his studio would stop making them and that he himself had never allowed his 15-year-old son to see them. The Public Enemy The Public Enemy ( Enemies of
1957-546: A picture, to be titled Mad Dog of Europe , which was intended to be a full-scale attack on Hitler. Jaffe had quit his job at RKO Pictures to make the film. Hays summoned the pair to his office and told them to cease production as they were causing needless headaches for the studios. Germany had threatened to seize all the properties of the Hollywood producers in Germany and ban the import of any future American films. In
2060-448: A potential government takeover of film censorship and social research seeming to indicate that movies that were seen to be immoral could promote bad behavior, was enough pressure to force the studios to capitulate to greater oversight. In 1922, after some risqué films and a series of off-screen scandals involving Hollywood stars, the studios enlisted Presbyterian elder Will H. Hays to rehabilitate Hollywood's image. Hays, later nicknamed
2163-549: A product of the excesses of the previous decade. In looking back upon the 1920s, events were increasingly seen as occurring in prelude to the market crash. In Dance, Fools, Dance (1931), lurid party scenes featuring 1920s flappers are played to excess. Joan Crawford ultimately reforms her ways and is saved; less fortunate is William Bakewell , who continues on the careless path that leads to his ultimate self-destruction. For Rain or Shine (1930), Milton Ager and Jack Yellen composed " Happy Days Are Here Again ". The song
SECTION 20
#17327918636462266-456: A restaurant on the night of Matt's wedding reception to Mamie, Tom and Matt recognize Putty Nose and follow him home. Begging for his life, Putty plays a song on the piano that he had entertained Tom and Matt with when they were children. Tom shoots him in the back, while a dazed Matt watches. Tom gives his mother a large wad of money, but Mike rejects the gift. Tom tears up the banknotes and throws them in his brother's face. "Nails" Nathan dies in
2369-471: A result. He also threatens to fire Loretta Young 's character, who pretends to be single to stay employed, unless she sleeps with him, then attempts to ruin her husband after learning she is married. Films that stated a position about a social issue were usually labeled either "propaganda films" or "preachment yarns". In contrast to Goldwyn and MGM's definitively Republican stance on social issue films, Warner Brothers, led by New Deal advocate Jack L. Warner ,
2472-429: A ticket just before that scene went onscreen, go enjoy the scene, leave, then come back during the next show just in time to see only that scene again. The scene was parodied years later in the 1961 Cagney movie One, Two, Three when Cagney threatens Otto ( Horst Buchholz ) with a half grapefruit but then decides against doing so. The film featured a prologue "apprising the audience that the hoodlums and terrorists of
2575-415: A way that might arouse passion or be made to seem right and permissible. All criminal action had to be punished, and neither the crime nor the criminal could elicit sympathy from the audience. Authority figures had to be treated respectfully, and the clergy could not be portrayed as comic characters or villains. Under some circumstances, politicians, police officers and judges could be villains, as long as it
2678-586: A written prologue added before the opening credits, advising that gangsters such as Tom Powers and Caesar "Rico" Bandello, the title character in Little Caesar (played by Edward G. Robinson ), are a menace that the public must confront. As with many a Warner/First National pre-code talkie , a print has been in the Library of Congress since the 1970s. The film has been available to the public for several decades, due to several video and DVD releases. In
2781-581: Is Mrs. Laurel, and Rina De Liguoro is in the Mae Busch role as Oliver's old girlfriend. James Finlayson, however, reprises his role as the Hardy butler and still absorbs the abuse—and even more—from the magician and the regurgitator in the added scenes. Pre-Code Hollywood Pre-Code Hollywood was an era in the American film industry that occurred between the widespread adoption of sound in film in
2884-533: Is again enlisted, this time to get an imbecile, who is accidentally in the running for Governor, elected. The candidate wins the election despite his incessant, embarrassing mishaps. Washington Merry-Go-Round portrayed the state of a political system stuck in neutral. Columbia Pictures considered releasing the film with a scene of the public execution of a politician as the climax before deciding to cut it. Cecil B. DeMille released This Day and Age in 1933, and it stands in stark contrast to his other films of
2987-797: Is based on an unpublished novel— Beer and Blood by two former newspapermen, John Bright and Kubec Glasmon —who had witnessed some of Al Capone 's murderous gang rivalries in Chicago. In 1998, The Public Enemy was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". As youngsters in 1900s Chicago, Irish-Americans Tom Powers and his lifelong friend Matt Doyle engage in petty theft, selling stolen items to "Putty Nose". Putty Nose persuades them to join his gang on
3090-410: Is based on nothing more than "beer and blood". Tom retorts in disgust: "Your hands ain't so clean. You killed and liked it. You didn't get them medals for holding hands with them Germans." Tom and Matt acquire girlfriends, Kitty and Mamie, respectively. Tom eventually tires of Kitty; when she complains once too often, he angrily pushes half a grapefruit into her face. He then drops her for Gwen Allen. At
3193-470: Is decidedly anti-capitalist; however, its preface claims otherwise: In many parts of the South today, there exists an endless dispute between rich land-owners, known as planters, and the poor cotton pickers, known as "peckerwoods". The planters supply the tenants with the simple requirements of everyday life and; in return, the tenants work the land year in and year out. A hundred volumes could be written on
Chickens Come Home - Misplaced Pages Continue
3296-477: Is inhabited by the archangel Gabriel upon being knocked unconscious. The spirit's behavior is similar to that of Abraham Lincoln . The president solves the nation's unemployment crisis and executes an Al Capone -type criminal who has continually flouted the law. Dictators were not just glorified in fiction. Columbia's Mussolini Speaks (1933) was a 76-minute paean to the fascist leader, narrated by NBC radio commentator Lowell Thomas . After showing some of
3399-405: Is not a Hugoesque fable of gangsters fighting among themselves, but a documentary drama of the bandit standing against society. It carries to its ultimate absurdity the fashion for romanticizing gangsters, for even in defeat the public enemy is endowed with grandeur." Variety called it "low-brow material given such workmanship as to make it high-brow" which attempts to "square everything [with]
3502-401: Is to ENTERTAIN. ... This we must keep before us at all times and we must realize constantly the fatality of ever permitting our concern with social values to lead us into the realm of propaganda ... the American motion picture ... owes no civic obligation greater than the honest presentment of clean entertainment and maintains that in supplying effective entertainment, free of propaganda, we serve
3605-610: The Disney-MGM Studios theme park in Orlando, Florida . In 1998, The Public Enemy was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2001, the Sopranos episode " Proshai, Livushka " featured title character Tony Soprano watching scenes from the film, becoming overwhelmed with emotion. In 2003
3708-581: The Great Depression of the 1930s motivated studios to produce films with racy and violent content, which boosted ticket sales. Soon, the flouting of the code became an open secret. In 1931, The Hollywood Reporter mocked the code, and Variety followed suit in 1933. In the same year as the Variety article, a noted screenwriter stated that "the Hays moral code is not even a joke any more; it's just
3811-529: The Strand , weaker than most in its story, stronger than most in its acting, and, like most, maintaining a certain level of interest through the last burst of machine-gun fire"; Woods and Cagney give "remarkably lifelike portraits of young hoodlums" and "Beryl Mercer as Tom's mother, Robert Emmett O'Connor as a gang chief, and Donald Cook as Tom's brother, do splendidly." Time magazine called The Public Enemy "well-told" and noted, "Unlike City Streets , this
3914-689: The Victorian era was sometimes ridiculed as being naïve and backward. When the Code was announced, The Nation , a liberal periodical, attacked it. The publication stated that if crime were never presented in a sympathetic light, then, taken literally, "law" and "justice" would become the same. Therefore, events such as the Boston Tea Party could not be portrayed. And if clergy were always to be presented positively, then hypocrisy could not be examined either. The Outlook agreed. Additionally,
4017-483: The "Match King", who attempts to corner the global market on matches. William's vile character, Paul Kroll, commits robbery, fraud, and murder on his way from a janitor to a captain of industry. When the market collapses in the 1929 crash, Kroll is ruined and chooses suicide over imprisonment. William played another unscrupulous businessman in Skyscraper Souls (1932): David Dwight, a wealthy banker who owns
4120-525: The "screen Landis". In 1924, Hays introduced a set of recommendations dubbed "The Formula", which the studios were advised to heed, and asked filmmakers to describe to his office the plots of films they were planning. The Supreme Court had already decided unanimously in 1915 in Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio that free speech did not extend to motion pictures, and while there had been token attempts to clean up
4223-529: The 1920s. "After two years the Jazz Age seems as far away as the days before the war", F. Scott Fitzgerald commented in 1931. In the sense noted by Fitzgerald, understanding the moral climate of the early 1930s is complex. Although films experienced an unprecedented level of freedom and dared to portray things that would be kept hidden for several decades, many in America looked upon the stock market crash as
Chickens Come Home - Misplaced Pages Continue
4326-633: The October 29, 1929, market crash) highlighted Bow's sexual attractiveness. 1920s stars such as Bow, Gloria Swanson , and Norma Talmadge freely displayed their sexuality in a straightforward fashion. The Great Depression presented a unique time for film-making in the United States. The economic disaster brought on by the stock market crash of 1929 changed American values and beliefs in various ways. Themes of American exceptionalism and traditional concepts of personal achievement, self-reliance, and
4429-488: The Pre-Code era was more incendiary than the gangster film; neither preachment yarns nor vice films so outraged the moral guardians or unnerved the city fathers as the high caliber scenarios that made screen heroes out of stone killers. In the early 1930s, several real-life criminals became celebrities. Two in particular captured the American imagination: Al Capone and John Dillinger . Gangsters like Capone had transformed
4532-627: The Public in the UK) is a 1931 American pre-Code gangster film produced and distributed by Warner Bros. The film was directed by William A. Wellman , and starring James Cagney , Jean Harlow , Edward Woods , Donald Cook and Joan Blondell . The film relates the story of a young man's rise in the criminal underworld in Prohibition -era urban America. The supporting players include Beryl Mercer , Murray Kinnell , and Mae Clarke . The screenplay
4635-1168: The Studio Relations Committee (SRC) and the major studios, and popular opinion than by strict adherence to the Hays Code, which was often ignored by Hollywood filmmakers. As a result, some films in the late 1920s and early 1930s depicted or implied sexual innuendo , romantic and sexual relationships between white and black people, mild profanity , illegal drug use , promiscuity , prostitution , infidelity , abortion , intense violence , and homosexuality . Nefarious characters were seen to profit from their deeds, in some cases without significant repercussions. For example, gangsters in films such as The Public Enemy , Little Caesar , and Scarface were seen by many as heroic rather than evil. Strong female characters were ubiquitous in such pre-Code films as Female , Baby Face or Red-Headed Woman , among many others, which featured independent, sexually liberated women. Many of Hollywood's biggest stars, such as Clark Gable , Bette Davis , James Cagney , Barbara Stanwyck , Joan Blondell , and Edward G. Robinson , got their start in
4738-568: The United States enters World War I in 1917, Mike enlists in the Marines. In 1920, with Prohibition about to go into effect, Paddy Ryan recruits Tom and Matt as beer "salesmen" (enforcers) in his bootlegging business. He allies himself with noted gangster Samuel "Nails" Nathan. As the bootlegging business becomes ever more lucrative, Tom and Matt flaunt their wealth. Mike finds out that his brother's money comes not from politics, as Tom claims, but from bootlegging, and declares that Tom's success
4841-419: The actor to really hit Cagney. Cook played his part a bit too well, and he struck Cagney in the mouth with such force, he actually broke one of Cagney's teeth. Yet in spite of his genuine shock and pain, Cagney stayed in character and played out the rest of the scene. In another incident, live ammunition was used in a scene where Tom Powers ducks around the corner of a building to take cover from machine gun fire;
4944-458: The audience as to how to commit crime. Sadistic violence and reaction shots showing the faces of individuals on the receiving end of violence were considered especially sensitive areas. The Code later recommended against scenes showing robbery, theft, safe-cracking, arson, "the use of firearms", "dynamiting of trains, machines, and buildings" and "brutal killings", on the basis that they would be rejected by local censors. No motion picture genre of
5047-606: The audience feels sure that evil is wrong and good is right." The Code contained an addendum, commonly referred to as the Advertising Code, that regulated film advertising copy and imagery. On February 19, 1930, Variety published the entire contents of the Code. Soon the men obligated to enforce the code – Jason Joy, who was the head of the Committee until 1932, and his successor, Dr. James Wingate – would be seen as generally ineffective. The first film
5150-425: The audiences' desire for realism led to certain unsavory social, legal, and political issues being portrayed in film. The length of pre-Code films was usually comparatively short, but that running time often required tighter material and did not affect the impact of message films. Employees' Entrance (1933) received the following 1985 review from Jonathan Rosenbaum : "As an attack on ruthless capitalism, it goes
5253-399: The authority to order studios to remove material from a film in 1930, but instead worked by reasoning and sometimes pleading with them. Complicating matters, the appeals process ultimately put the responsibility for making the final decision in the hands of the studios themselves. One factor in ignoring the Code was the fact that some found such censorship prudish. This was a period in which
SECTION 50
#17327918636465356-529: The ban on homosexuality or the use of specific curse words, were never directly mentioned but were assumed to be understood without clear demarcation. Miscegenation, the mixing of the races, was forbidden. The Code stated that the notion of an "adults-only policy" would be a dubious, ineffective strategy that would be difficult to enforce. However, it did allow that "maturer minds may easily understand and accept without harm subject matter in plots which does younger people positive harm." If children were supervised and
5459-460: The breaking point. These economic circumstances led to a loss of nearly half of the weekly attendance numbers and closure of almost a third of the country's theaters in the first few years of the depression. Even so, 60 million Americans went to the cinema weekly. Apart from the economic realities of the conversion to sound, were the artistic considerations. Early sound films were often noted for being too verbose. In 1930, Carl Laemmle criticized
5562-537: The character of Tom Powers was among the AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains , placing 42nd in the villain list. In 2008, the film appeared on one of the AFI's 10 Top 10 lists—the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres. The Public Enemy was listed as the eighth best in the gangster film genre . The film was re-released in 1941 after the Production Code was put into effect. Three scenes from
5665-439: The connection between mobsters and Broadway productions in movies such as Lights of New York (1928), Tenderloin (1928), and Broadway (1929). The Hays Office had never officially recommended banning violence in any form in the 1920s—unlike profanity, the drug trade or prostitution—but advised that it be handled carefully. New York's censor board was more thorough than that of any other state, missing only around 50 of
5768-502: The country's 1,000 to 1,300 annual releases. From 1927 to 1928, violent scenes removed included those in which a gun was pointed at the camera or "at or into the body of another character". Also subject to potential censorship were scenes involving machine guns, criminals shooting at law enforcement officers, stabbing or knife brandishing (audiences considered stabbings more disturbing than shootings), whippings, choking, torture and electrocution, as well as scenes perceived as instructive to
5871-413: The dilemma of honoring both social obligations and the demands of the blackmailer, Ollie enlists Stan's aid in a precarious scheme. Stan's visit to the blackmailer's apartment triggers a series of misunderstandings, culminating in a cascade of suspicions and comedic misinterpretations among the various characters. The narrative escalates with the blackmailer's unexpected appearance at Ollie's residence during
5974-411: The dinner party, where Ollie resorts to audacious subterfuge to avert exposure. As tensions mount and farcical circumstances unfold, the narrative reaches its climax when the real Mrs. Laurel arrives, brandishing a hatchet, and Stan, overcome with trepidation, makes a hasty retreat. A Spanish-language version of this film was completely re-shot with the stars delivering their lines in phonetic Spanish. It
6077-410: The early 1900s, the United States was still primarily a rural country, especially in self-identity. D. W. Griffith 's The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912) is one of the earliest American films to feature urban organized crime. Prohibition 's arrival in 1920 created an environment in which those who wished to consume alcohol often had to consort with criminals, especially in urban areas. Nonetheless,
6180-483: The early 1930s. Complicating matters for the studios, the advent of sound film in 1927 required an immense expenditure in sound stages, recording booths, cameras, and movie-theater sound systems, not to mention the new-found artistic complications of producing in a radically altered medium. The studios were in a difficult financial position even before the market crash as the sound conversion process and some risky purchases of theater chains had pushed their finances near
6283-578: The economic realities of a country struggling to find its next meal. In Blonde Venus (1932), Marlene Dietrich 's character resorts to prostitution to feed her child, and Claudette Colbert 's character in It Happened One Night (1934) gets her comeuppance for throwing a tray of food onto the floor by later finding herself without food or financial resources. Joan Blondell 's character in Big City Blues (1932) reflects that, as
SECTION 60
#17327918636466386-450: The era. Other stars who excelled during this period, however, like Ruth Chatterton (who decamped to England) and Warren William (the so-called "king of pre-Code", who died in 1948), would be largely forgotten by the general public within a generation. Beginning in late 1933 and escalating throughout the first half of 1934, American Catholics launched a campaign against what they deemed the immorality of American cinema. This, along with
6489-399: The events implied elliptically, the code allowed what Brandeis University cultural historian Thomas Doherty called "the possibility of a cinematically inspired thought crime ". The Code sought not only to determine what could be portrayed on screen, but also to promote traditional values. Sexual relations outside of marriage could not be portrayed as attractive and beautiful, presented in
6592-459: The fertilizer trade, as indicated by the inscription on their office door. Ollie, seated at his desk, orchestrates affairs with the demeanor of a commanding executive, while his colleague, Stan, is summoned from the "sampler room," reflecting their professional responsibilities. An interaction ensues where Ollie, harboring political ambitions, dictates a mayoral acceptance speech to Laurel, underscoring his aspirations for civic leadership. Things take
6695-425: The film were cut because of the Code. One is of a markedly effeminate tailor measuring Tom for a suit, another where Mamie serves Matt breakfast in bed, and the third showing Tom being taken advantage of by Paddy Ryan's girlfriend while hiding out in her apartment. These three scenes were later restored for all DVD and Blu-ray releases, and on Turner Classic Movies . The film was also re-released in 1954, with
6798-494: The film's message. The Jazz Age prelude was almost singularly used to cast shame on the boisterous behavior of the 1920s. Cabin in the Cotton (1932) is a Warner Bros. message film about the evils of capitalism. The film takes place in an unspecified southern state where workers are given barely enough to survive and taken advantage of by being charged exorbitant interest rates and high prices by unscrupulous landowners. The film
6901-553: The following songs: The music was performed by the Vitaphone Orchestra, led by conductor David Mendoza. According to Warner Bros records the film earned $ 464,000 domestically and $ 93,000 internationally. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes , 100% of 33 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 8.3/10. Andre Sennwald, who reviewed the film for The New York Times on its April 1931 release, called it "just another gangster film at
7004-642: The late 1920s and the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code censorship guidelines (popularly known as the Hays Code ) in 1934. Although the Hays Code was adopted in 1930, oversight was poor, and it did not become rigorously enforced until July 1, 1934, with the establishment of the Production Code Administration . Before that date, film content was restricted more by local laws, negotiations between
7107-439: The legal system turns innocent characters into criminals. The life of Joan Crawford 's character is ruined and her romantic interest is executed so that she may live free, although she is innocent of the crime for which the district attorney wants to convict her. Religious hypocrisy was addressed in such films as The Miracle Woman (1931), starring Barbara Stanwyck and directed by Frank Capra . Many pre-Code films dealt with
7210-570: The list, and Hays created the Studio Relations Committee (SRC) to oversee its implementation. However, there was still no way to enforce these tenets. The controversy surrounding film standards came to a head in 1929. Director Cecil B. DeMille was responsible for the increasing discussion of sex in cinema in the 1920s. Starting with Male and Female (1919), he made a series of films that examined sex and were highly successful. Films featuring Hollywood's original " It girl " Clara Bow such as The Saturday Night Kid (released four days before
7313-564: The motion picture "Czar", was paid the then-lavish sum of $ 100,000 a year (equivalent to more than $ 1.7 million in 2022 dollars). Hays had previously served as U.S. Postmaster General under president Warren G. Harding and as the head of the Republican National Committee . At the time of his hiring, he was president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA); he held
7416-601: The movies before, such as when the studios formed the National Association of the Motion Picture Industry (NAMPI) in 1916, little had come of the efforts. In 1929, Catholic layman Martin Quigley , editor of the prominent trade paper Motion Picture Herald , and Father Daniel A. Lord , a Jesuit priest, created a code of standards (of which Hays strongly approved) and submitted it to
7519-434: The office reviewed, The Blue Angel , which was passed by Joy without revision, was considered indecent by a California censor. Although there were several instances where Joy negotiated cuts from films, and there were indeed definite, albeit loose, constraints, a significant amount of lurid material made it to the screen. Joy had to review 500 films a year using a small staff and little power. The Hays office did not have
7622-783: The opinion of Brooks's biographer Barry Paris , "turning down Public Enemy marked the real end of Louise Brooks's film career". Tom's first girlfriend Kitty was played by Mae Clarke , who was uncredited. Kitty is eventually dumped by Tom for Gwen after he pushes half a grapefruit into her face, the most famous scene in the movie. Joan Blondell played Mamie, Matt's girlfriend. She had already worked with Cagney in Sinners' Holiday (1930) and would work with him on two films which also came out this year: Other Men's Women and Blonde Crazy . Other films that they worked together on were The Crowd Roars (1932), Footlight Parade (1933) and He Was Her Man (1934). Cagney once said that Blondell
7725-491: The overcoming of odds lost great currency. Due to the constant empty economic reassurances from politicians in the early years of the Depression, the American public developed an increasingly jaded attitude. The cynicism, challenging of traditional beliefs, and political controversy of Hollywood films during this period mirrored the attitudes of many of their patrons. Also gone was the carefree and adventurous lifestyle of
7828-527: The part and switched the two actors but never reshot the sequences with the characters as children, which is why the child playing Cagney's role looks like Woods while the one playing Woods' role looks like Cagney. Another reason for the switch is that the sound technology used in The Public Enemy was superior to that used in earlier films, making it no longer imperative to have an actor in the lead role who had impeccable enunciation. Louise Brooks
7931-413: The perception of entire cities. Capone gave Chicago its "reputation as the locus classicus of American gangsterdom, a cityscape where bullet-proof roadsters with tommygun-toting hoodlums on running boards careened around State Street spraying fusillades of slugs into flower shop windows and mowing down the competition in blood-spattered garages". Capone appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1930. He
8034-482: The period. Filmed shortly after DeMille had completed a five-month tour of the Soviet Union , This Day and Age takes place in America and features several children torturing a gangster who got away with the murder of a popular local shopkeeper. The youngsters are seen lowering the gangster into a vat of rats when the police arrive, and their response is to encourage the youths to continue this. The film ends with
8137-489: The position for 25 years and "defended the industry from attacks, recited soothing nostrums , and negotiated treaties to cease hostilities". Hollywood mimicked the decision Major League Baseball had made in hiring judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis as League Commissioner the previous year to quell questions about the integrity of baseball in the wake of the 1919 World Series gambling scandal ; The New York Times called Hays
8240-548: The progress Italy has made during Mussolini 's 10-year reign, Thomas opines, "This is a time when a dictator comes in handy!" The film was viewed by over 175,000 jubilant people during its first two weeks at the cavernous Palace Theater in Albany, New York . The election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) in 1932 quelled the public affection for dictators. As the country became increasingly enthraled with FDR, who
8343-527: The rights and wrongs of both parties, but it is not the object of the producers of Cabin in the Cotton to take sides. We are only concerned with the effort to picture these conditions. In the end, however, the planters admit their wrongdoing and agree to a more equitable distribution of capital. The avaricious businessman remained a recurring character in pre-Code cinema. In The Match King (1932), Warren William played an industrialist based on real-life Swedish entrepreneur Ivar Kreuger , himself nicknamed
8446-501: The rights to the novel and assigned director William A. Wellman to direct the film. Wellman, who had served in World War I, like the brother of the main character, told Warner: "I'll bring you the toughest, most violent picture you ever did see". Edward Woods was originally cast in the lead role of Tom Powers and James Cagney was cast as Tom's best friend Matt Doyle, until director Wellman decided Cagney would be more effective in
8549-514: The shootout and ends up in the hospital. When his mother, brother, and Matt's sister Molly come to see him, he reconciles with Mike and agrees to reform. However, Paddy warns Mike that Tom has been kidnapped by the Burns mob from the hospital. A member of the Paddy gang telephones Mike to say Tom is returning from the hospital; their mother is overjoyed and begins preparing Tom's bedroom. When Mike answers
8652-645: The streets in protest became a prevalent sight during the Great Depression. The Bonus Army protests of World War I veterans on the capital in Washington, D.C., on which Hoover unleashed a brutal crackdown, prompted many of the Hollywood depictions. Although social issues were examined more directly in the pre-Code era, Hollywood still largely ignored the Great Depression, as many films sought to ameliorate patrons' anxieties rather than incite them. Hays remarked in 1932: The function of motion pictures
8755-569: The studios wanted to appease the German government. The ban on Jews and negative portrayals of Germany by Hitler's government even led to a significant reduction in work for Jews in Hollywood until after the end of World War II. As a result, only two social problem films released by independent film companies addressed the mania in Germany during the pre-Code era ( Are We Civilized? and Hitler's Reign of Terror ). In 1933, Herman J. Mankiewicz and producer Sam Jaffe announced they were working on
8858-503: The studios. Lord's concerns centered on the effects sound film had on children, whom he considered especially susceptible to the medium's allure. Several studio heads, including Irving Thalberg of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), met with Lord and Quigley in February 1930. After some revisions, they agreed to the stipulations of the Code. One of the main motivating factors in adopting the Code was to avoid direct government intervention. It
8961-450: The surface of American life in the Depression was the fear of the angry mob, portrayed in panicked hysteria in films such as Gabriel Over the White House (1933), The Mayor of Hell (1933), and American Madness (1932). Massive wide shots of angry hordes, comprising sometimes hundreds of men, rush into action in terrifyingly efficient uniformity. Groups of agitated men either standing in breadlines, loitering in hobo camps, or marching
9064-426: The time the film was released on March 31, 1933, FDR's election had produced a level of hopefulness in America that rendered the film's message obsolete. Adolf Hitler 's rise to power in Germany and his regime's anti-Semitic policies significantly affected American pre-Code filmmaking. Although Hitler had become unpopular in many parts of the United States, Germany was still a voluminous importer of American films and
9167-481: The underworld must be exposed and the glamour ripped from them" and an epilogue "pointing the moral that civilization is on her knees and inquiring loudly as to what is to be done." At the film's premiere in New York City, the film's prologue was preceded by a "brief stage tableau , with sinuous green lighting, which shows a puppet gangster shooting another puppet gangster in the back." The soundtrack included
9270-431: The unscripted action. However, in her autobiography, Clarke stated that Cagney had told her prior to that take what he planned to do. She said that her only genuine surprise came later, when she saw the grapefruit scene appear in the final film, as it had been her understanding that they were shooting it only as a joke to amuse the crew. According to Cagney, Clarke's ex-husband had the grapefruit scene timed, and would buy
9373-734: The urban-crime genre was mostly ignored until 1927 when Underworld , which is recognized as the first gangster movie, became a surprise hit. According to the Encyclopedia of Hollywood entry on Underworld , "The film established the fundamental elements of the gangster movie: a hoodlum hero; ominous, night-shrouded city streets; floozies; and a blazing finale in which the cops cut down the protagonist." Gangster films such as Thunderbolt (1929) and Doorway to Hell (1930) were released to capitalize on Underworld ' s popularity, with Thunderbolt being described as "a virtual remake" of Underworld . Other late-1920s crime films investigated
9476-557: The use of live ammunition was common practice at the time. The bullets struck the wall of the building at the position where Cagney's head had been just a moment before. In a 1973 interview featured in the Turner Classic Movies documentary The Men Who Made The Movies: William Wellman , Wellman said he added the grapefruit "hitting" to the scene, because when he and his wife at the time would get into fights, she would never talk or give any expression. Since she always had
9579-557: The wall-to-wall banter of sound pictures, and director Ernst Lubitsch wondered what the camera was intended for if characters were going to narrate all the onscreen action. The film industry also withstood competition from the home radio, and often characters in films went to great lengths to belittle other media. The film industry was not above using the new medium to broadcast commercials for its projects however, and occasionally turned radio stars into short feature performers to take advantage of their built-in following. Seething beneath
9682-502: The youngsters taking the gangster to a local judge and forcing the magistrate to conduct a trial in which the outcome is never in doubt. The need for strong leaders who could take charge and steer America out of its crisis is seen in Gabriel Over the White House (1933), about a benevolent dictator who takes control of the United States. Walter Huston stars as a weak-willed, ineffectual president (likely modeled after Hoover) who
9785-470: Was clear that they were the exception to the rule. The entire document contained Catholic undertones and stated that art must be handled carefully because it could be "morally evil in its effects" and because its "deep moral significance" was unquestionable. The Catholic influence on the Code was initially kept secret, owing to the Anti-Catholic bias of the time. A recurring theme was "throughout,
9888-622: Was even offered seven-figure sums by two major Hollywood studios to appear in a film, but he declined. Dillinger became a national celebrity as a bank robber who eluded arrest and escaped confinement several times. He had become the most celebrated public outlaw since Jesse James . His father appeared in a popular series of newsreels giving police homespun advice on how to catch his son. Dillinger's popularity rose so quickly that Variety joked that "if Dillinger remains at large much longer and more such interviews are obtained, there may be some petitions circulated to make him our president." Hays wrote
9991-466: Was expanded to one hour by adding scenes of magician Abraham J. Cantu and vaudeville regurgitator Hadji Ali performing at the Hardy dinner party. Titled Politiquerias , the film was released in Latin American and Spanish markets as a feature. Joining headliners Laurel and Hardy in this version is a supporting cast of native Spanish speakers: Linda Loredo portrays Mrs. Hardy, Carmen Granada
10094-404: Was featured in countless newsreels , it exhibited less desire for alternative forms of government. Many Hollywood films reflected this new optimism. Heroes for Sale , despite being a tremendously bleak and at times anti-American film, ends on a positive note as the New Deal appears as a sign of optimism. When Wild Boys of the Road (1933), directed by William Wellman , reaches its conclusion,
10197-582: Was repeated sarcastically by characters in several films such as Under Eighteen (1931) and 20,000 Years in Sing Sing (1933). Less comical was the picture of the United States' future presented in Heroes for Sale that same year (1933), in which a hobo looks into a depressing night and proclaims, "It's the end of America". Heroes for Sale was directed by prolific pre-Code director William Wellman and featured silent film star Richard Barthelmess as
10300-423: Was the most prominent maker of these types of films and preferred they be called "Americanism stories". Pre-Code historian Thomas Doherty has written that two recurring elements marked the so-called preachment yarns. "The first is the exculpatory preface; the second is the Jazz Age prelude." The preface was essentially a softened version of a disclaimer that intended to calm any in the audience who disagreed with
10403-532: Was the only woman he loved besides his wife. Donald Cook played Tom's brother, Mike. Filming took place in January and February 1931, with a small budget of $ 151,000. During filming, Cagney also made Smart Money , co-starring Edward G. Robinson , who had finished his breakthrough film Little Caesar . In the scene where Mike Powers punches his brother Tom, Wellman privately took Donald Cook aside and, explaining his desire for authenticity in Tom's reaction, asked
10506-518: Was the original choice for Gwen Allen, a woman with self-confessed weakness for bad men. She refused the role, which went to a younger actress, Jean Harlow . Brooks' name was in studio records/casting call lists playing "Bess" in this movie, but she and her character did not appear. Brooks later explained herself to Wellman (who had directed her in Beggars of Life (1928)) by saying that she hated making pictures because she simply "hated Hollywood ". In
10609-426: Was the responsibility of the Studio Relations Committee, headed by Colonel Jason S. Joy, to supervise film production and advise the studios when changes or cuts were required. The Code was divided into two parts. The first was a set of "general principles" that mostly concerned morality. The second was a set of "particular applications", an exacting list of items that could not be depicted. Some restrictions, such as
#645354