Safe in Hell

"Safe in Hell" proved to be a stunning movie in many respects, a major precursor of film noir both thematically and stylistically. Wellman and cinematographer Sid Hickox stage many of the scenes in chiaroscuro darkness, and even the opening title — in which the words "SAFE IN HELL" appear as cutouts in a black field with fire billowing forth from behind the letters — is visually stunning and sets the mood for the film instead of merely announcing what it's called. (The title and the director's name — in small print on the same card — are the only credits we see at the outset; the other credits are relegated to the end, in the fashion that's now become standard but was highly unusual in 1931.) The script requires the actors, Mackaill and Cook in particular, to make some pretty abrupt hairpin turns in emotions and motivations, but it's a testament to their skill (especially Mackaill's — Cook's is a pretty straightforward good-guy lead and his only spectacular sequence is the early one in which his loathing suddenly turns into desperate protectiveness and love when she's about to be arrested) that all the emotional turns are quite credible and she's equally believable as a bad girl and a good one. Like Charles Vidor's "Sensation Hunters", made for Monogram two years later and the closest film I could think of to the mood of this one, "Safe in Hell" manages to convey the oppressiveness of the environment and the desperation with which the heroine is faced in trying to maintain (what's left of) her virtue in the face of the economic and sexual pressures on her.

It also features two remarkable characters, the Black proprietess of the hotel on Tortuga where most of the action takes place (Nina Mae McKinney, the femme fatale of "Hallelujah!" here cast as a positive character) and her assistant, Newcastle (Clarence Muse). The screenwriters wrote the lines for McKinney and Muse in phony dialect but they actually delivered them in normal English. (Score one for William Wellman for allowing them to get away with that!) McKinney also gets to warble the song "When It's Sleepy Time Down South," ostensibly to a recording — no doubt the song got in the film because her Black co-star Muse co-wrote it with Leon and Otis René! Originally released with an advisory that the film was "Not for Children" (anticipating the Hollywood rating system that would ultimately displace the Production Code), "Safe in Hell" is a great movie, a forgotten gem that deserves to be better known than it is and an example of the Hollywood studio system working on all cylinders and producing something that acknowledged the clichés and yet also defied them quite movingly. Why Warner Home Video didn't include this on the boxed set of Wellman's pre-Code films for Warners — when it's a better movie than any of the ones they DID include — is beyond me.

In looking at the list of movies Nina Mae McKinney appeared in on this site, it mentioned that her part in this movie-as well as that of fellow African-American player Clarence Muse-had them speaking normal English as opposed to the stereotypical dialect associated with their race in films during this period. They do indeed sound normal-actually Muse seemed British when he spoke-and refreshingly non-stereotypical. One other player of their race has a silent role as a guard-Noble Johnson who would two years later appear in a more-iconic movie called King Kong. The story itself, about a New Orleans prostitute who gets smuggled to an uncharted island after killing the man responsible for her situation, was quite compelling especially when she encounters both Nina and Clarence there as possibly the only people who seemed concerned for her well-being. There are some white counterparts who are like them but many of them have sordid pasts like that of that prostitute. In summary, I'll just say Safe in Hell was quite a compelling pre-Code drama. P.S. The song Ms. McKinney performs here-"When It's Sleepytime Down South"-was co-written by Muse.

Although this film directed by the versatile William Wellman is not essentially different from many other fallen women pictures of the early talkie era, it has elements that lift it out of the ordinary. For contemporary viewers it's an opportunity to see Dorothy Mackaill in a starring role. She was a beautiful and self-possessed actress whose career came and went too quickly. At times she looks so much like Marion Davies that you could easily mistake them for twins. Here she plays a prostitute fleeing the law with a young fellow who loves her. He deposits her in a hotel on a steamy Caribbean island inhabited by escaped male criminals. There is the appealing shock of seeing two African-American actors actually speaking and behaving in a dignified and even admirable manner: Nina Mae MacKinney and Clarence Muse as a hotel proprietress and porter, respectively. Muse speaks the King's English better than the blonde leading lady and comports himself in a far more civilized manner than any of the white men. MacKinney is spectacular. She holds her own no matter who she is playing against and even sings a spirited round of "Sleepy Time Down South" as she pours wine for a large table of diners. Another case of wasted talent in the old Hollywood days.

Safe In Hell is is a cross between Sadie Thompson and The Getaway, with Dorothy Mackaill in stunning form as the 'bad girl' who runs away to a remote Caribbean island to escape her past. Director William Wellman delivers another quality picture, and we get to see Nina Mae McKinney's star power on display (including one hot jazz number!). The story is silly but fans of early thirties cinema need to see this.

I've wanted to see Safe in Hell for a long time, thinking it was some kind of archetypal pre-Code experience, and it's tawdry enough but fatally slow. Dorothy Mackaill plays a woman who was left behind by her sailor boyfriend, turned to prostitution, and ends up killing a john she apparently had a bad experience with before the movie started. That's the first ten minutes or so, and it's pretty good. Then the sailor boyfriend, who gets over the prostitution and murder stuff pretty quickly, helps her escape and, making the same mistake with his not very strong-willed girlfriend a second time, plops her alone on a miserable little island with a group of exiled lowlifes who sit in rattan chairs all day ogling her.

This proves, ultimately if not convincingly, irresistible, and once she falls the second time, it's a short walk from there to being executed for a crime she didn't commit, and trying hard to keep the secret of her sorry end from her sailor boyfriend, who really needs to find a nice gal he can leave alone somewhere for five minutes without her killing somebody, regardless of the circumstances.

I think the island stuff was originally a play, in the far-east-sleaze mode of Kongo, Shanghai Gesture, etc., and if so I think there must have been more action in it than made it to the screen, because there's a lot of suggestion that something's going to happen, but not much actually does. Mackaill is all right, she's certainly attractive and doesn't object to a pre-Code wardrobe, but she doesn't make as strong an impression as, say, Barbara Stanwyck, who was evidently Wellman's first choice.

The strongest impression is made by Nina Mae McKinney and Clarence Muse as the hotel proprietors, who exude a warmth and conviviality in their scenes that seems to have come from a different movie (and suggests that the Hell of the island was brought there by its white visitors, not intrinsic to the place). McKinney, the wonderful star of the very early sound Hallelujah!, even gets to sing a song, in the only on-screen appearance of her MGM contract (loaned out to Warners). It makes you a wish for a very different movie about her character, rather than Mackaill's.