Parachute Jumper

PARACHUTE JUMPER (1933), famously singled out by Bette Davis as one of the awful films she was required to make in the early years of her Warner Bros. contract, certainly isn't anything substantial. But it's a surprisingly fun Pre-Code flick.

The movie is carried by its three stars: Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Bette Davis, and Frank McHugh. Fairbanks in particular gives a winning, charismatic performance. Fairbanks and McHugh play a couple of ex-airmen who are desperate for work during the Great Depression. They're so broke that they take turns wearing one suit of clothes.

Fairbanks hops around from job to job, from aerial stuntman one day to chauffeur the next, ultimately getting mixed up with rum-running gangsters. (This is a Warner Bros. film, after all.) McHugh has less luck finding employment. Davis, playing an out-of-work stenographer called "Alabama", uses a Southern accent throughout. (Why not?) Fairbanks invites Davis to share the apartment he's got with McHugh, and the three become one little happy family, cheering each other on and scraping around to put food in their stomachs.

Fairbanks and McHugh play off each other well as the two buddies. Miss Davis is young and blonde and sweet and pretty, and fits in nicely with the boys. Her great acting triumphs were still to come, but she's always a pleasure to watch (even in films she despised).

There are a few Pre-Code touches that stand out to the trained observer. Firstly, the sound of a toilet flushing (before Hollywood was forced to ignore the very existence of toilets). There are also a couple of rather amusing (if homophobic) scenes where Fairbanks and McHugh joke around in "sissy" voices. And when a car passes by when Frank McHugh is thumbing for a ride, he gives the driver an entirely different hand gesture.

As far as 70-minute Pre-Code films go, PARACHUTE JUMPER is rather enjoyable. The story isn't very deep, but it's not exactly something you've seen before. Fairbanks, McHugh, and Davis seem to have a good time. There's biplanes and booze, gangsters and guns, good girls and shady dames, romance and wisecracks, and even some parachute jumping. The movie's got just about everything, and it's all rather fast-paced and light-hearted. A good time.

About two ex-Marine pilots, Bill and Toodles (Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and Frank McHugh), who move into a small apartment together in New York City but can't seem to find work. Bill soon meets up with a blonde in the park by the name of "Alabama" (Bette Davis), and, believe it or not, she agrees to move in with him after one lunch out together where they bond as they steal a bottle of ketchup and sundries from the café, and then steal a fish from a cat. Bill and Toodles end up sleeping head to foot in the same bed, while Alabama settles in on the couch. Bill soon starts earning dough for the trio, first by making a $75 parachute jump (right above the railroad tracks!), then becoming chauffeur for a wealthy blonde who picks her chauffeur by his physique rather than driving ability, and then he ends up as bodyguard/lackey for a mobster who "imports" booze and dope from Canada.

This film is pretty so-so, it sorts of switches gear from one thing to the next and just doesn't really seem to know what direction it wants to go in - just when you think the story is going one way, that ends, and on to something else. Even the title "Parachute Jumper" seems a bit odd, considering the parachute jumping is not the main focus of this film. Bette Davis is very cute in this, with platinum blonde hair and sassy Southern accent, she's very fun to watch and saves the film from being a complete bomb. Doug Fairbanks Jr. is just sort of bland throughout.

Love Bette Davis, and 'Parachute Jumper' is another film where she was my main reason for seeing it in the first place with no prior knowledge of it before. My recommended for you section and wanting to see all of her films and performances (up to this point had seen most but not all) are to thank for that. Liked the idea of the story and was interested too in seeing how Davis and the always watchable Douglas Fairbanks Jr would fare working together.

They fare very well together indeed, and 'Parachute Jumper' is a very enjoyable and well done film. It's an early Davis film and role and although she did go on to better things this is a long way from being a waste of her massive amount of talent. Fairbanks is similarly well served, if not at his best. 'Parachute Jumper' may have been made quickly and not on the highest of budgets, but manages to have more enjoyment and entertainment value than some expensively made productions, old and now.

Sure 'Parachute Jumper' is not perfect. The story can be messy at times and tries to do too much, shifting uneasily between them quickly which gave a jumpy feel.

Wouldn't have said no to Davis having more to do. Occasionally the camera lacks finesse but that is more forgivable.

However, 'Parachute Jumper' really doesn't look too bad for a quickie, some have looked much worse. Some nice shots here that clearly had a ball capturing the stunts and airwork. No wonder as the stunts and airwork are never less than astounding and the best of them jaw dropping. Alfred Green does a very nice job directing, keeping things moving and allowing the cast to have fun, which they do.

'Parachute Jumper's' script is one of its major assets, its sparkling wit is just infectious and some of it is surprisingly daring, being made before the code was enforced (likewise with censorship), meaning more flexibility and risks. The film moves at a fast clip, and well as the great chemistry of the cast it's its boldly honest look at the Depression, no sugar-coating here, and the pre-code material. Fairbanks and Davis are immensely charming and look as if they were having fun, Davis also is at her most adorable. Fairbanks and an amusing Frank McHugh work well too.

All in all, very enjoyable. 7/10

... but there is just about every precode device under the sun included. Bill Keller (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.) and Toodles Cooper (Frank McHugh) are Marine pilots in Nicaragua, and when they are finished with one particular mission get drunk, go AWOL, and soon thereafter their term of service ends. It's not explained how they managed the assumed honorable discharges, but then I don't know what the U.S. was doing in Nicaragua in 1933 either. They then answer an ad for pilots in the paper, only to find that the company has gone bust. They can't find jobs of any type anywhere. They do have a roof over their head for now, but sitting on a park bench they meet Alabama (Bette Davis) a homeless and hungry out of work stenographer. Bill asks Alabama to share their quarters with them, strictly on the up and up. She can tidy up the place in return for a place to stay.

Here is where one of the big myths of this film come in. I've heard and even read people say that Alabama and Bill are sleeping in the same bed, with his feet where her head is and vice versa. Not even in the precode era could they get away with that. It is Toodles and Bill who are sleeping in that position in the same bed. Alabama is on the couch.

In their quest for survival Bill does do one stunt wing-walking parachute jump, lands on the train tracks and almost gets hit by a train. The trio also encounter a gun moll (Claire Dodd) who passes herself off as Park Avenue high society with a taste for good looking chauffeurs (Bill) and in a case of unfortunate timing, the jealous gangster behind the moll. He catches his girl and Bill in an embrace. Instead of killing him, which the gangster intended to do, he winds up hiring Bill as a bodyguard and to do some rum running across the Canadian border.

The film is basically about how the little people survived the Depression with a bunch of gangsters and thrills thrown in for good measure. Don't really look for a big dose of Bette Davis in this one, this is mainly Fairbanks' film.

When first hired by the gangster, Bill is asked if he is afraid of the law. Bill replies "The law we all laugh at?". Bill, like many hungry people laugh at the law that does not protect them from starving in the 30's, and he doesn't mind running liquor or using a gun to protect the gangster, but he differentiates between that and narcotics (he thought it was liquor he was running) and setting up people to be shot down execution style with it being made to look like self defense. In other words, Bill finds that the law is one thing, but his own conscience is quite another.

When the gangster decides to set Bill up to take a fall for his syndicate, will Bill find a way out? If so how? Watch and find out.

Nothing really special happens in this film, it is just more fun unique entertainment Depression era style in a way that only Warner Brothers managed to be able to do it. It also showcased three people whose circumstances Depression audiences could relate to, if not their rather thrilling adventures. The idea is that Alabama, Bill, and Toodles may be down, but they are not out.

This pre-Code film is as all over the map as Bette Davis's awful attempt at a southern accent. It has elements of comedy, romance, aerial stunt work, and the cynical disillusionment that sprung from the Depression. While far from perfect in any of those areas, there's a certain appeal to the grab bag Alfred E. Green packed in to 72 minutes, and I have to say, it never got boring.

If you hadn't seen the release date and were wondering if the film was pre-Code or not, that's put to rest in the very first shot, an extended close-up of a "Nicaraguan" woman's butt swinging back and forth to tropical music. Despite Davis's character remaining "respectable" after she begins living with her male friends (Douglas Fairbanks Jr. And Frank McHugh), there are some other fun little pre-Code bits sprinkled in, including some random things like a toilet flush and a middle finger being extended. My favorite was a rich lady (Claire Dodd) having her new chauffeur (Fairbanks) turn around once more so that she can unabashedly ogle him up and down.

The other high point for me was the way disillusionment over the time period crept in to the script, but never kept the film from playing as light entertainment. The young couple steal a wrapped-up fish from an alley cat, and condiments from a diner. She resorts to flirting to get a job, likening what she said as no more meaningful than promises politicians make. Behind the closed door of the office of the Society for Enforcement of Prohibition, we find a guy drinking. Lastly, we get this exchange between Fairbanks and a prospective employer, morals going out the window out of necessity:

"Do you care what you do?" "If I get paid, I work." "Do you object to cracking, or I should say, denting the law a little here and there?" "What law?" "The one we all laugh at."

Unfortunately, for all of these little bits and some interesting biplane stunts, the film as a whole doesn't come together. Perhaps the biggest issue was that Davis's character wasn't given a lot of sizzle to her personality, and the romance with Fairbanks felt a little tacked on. It's also one of the worst performances I think I've seen from her, and I love her older films, like Three on a Match (1932) and Ex-Lady (1933). Aside from the accent, she seems unsteady, and at one point even flubs a line, saying "typewriter massages" instead of "typewriter messages." Meanwhile, the plot meanders randomly, and not enough is made out of the entanglement with organized crime to be completely satisfying. An interesting curio though.