Ten Cents a Dance

Back in the day when couples actually held each other while dancing the kind of place Barbara Stanwyck works in Ten Cents A Dance was fairly popular. Ten cents went a lot farther in those days. Today even given inflation you would pay a whole lot more and the dance would be on your lap.

One of Barbara's special customers is Ricardo Cortez, a man who's kept his business during the Depression and successfully, no easy task. She asks him to give one of her fellow boarders at her rooming house, Monroe Owsley a job in the firm. It seems to work out all around and she and Owsley get married.

But Owsley is a weak character and a poor gambler, losing money in penny ante card games and of all things playing the market in 1931, not a very sound idea. He embezzles $5000.00 from Cortez's firm. This is where Barbara has to make some critical choices, separate the men from the boys so to speak.

Lionel Barrymore who did some directing before the Oscar he won for A Free Soul brought him a contract with MGM to exclusively act directed this pre-Code potboiler. He does get good performances out of the three principal players. Another you won't forget is Sally Blane as the underage dime a dance girl and Blanche Frederici as the morals custodian of the dime a dance girls in her establishment.

Owsley who made a specialty of playing bad or weak characters died much too young. As for Barbara the role was definitely a boost for her young career at the time.

Fans of pre-Code films will forgive this 1931 Columbia Pictures feature directed by Lionel Barrymore (his last directorial effort) if only because it stars Barbara Stanwyck in an early role. As is the case with all stars, she is even then true in every moment, entirely believable, and far surpasses the wooden script and the rest of the cast. Most embarrassing is Monroe Owsley as her no-good husband; he is particularly bad, totally false, overacting. Ricardo Cortez has a thankless role and does his best. This is a perfect example of how a star can make something out of nothing by the sheer power of her personality.

This relic from before the days of the Production Code and the Hays Office is good fun, not great but entertaining.

Based on a song by Rogers & Hart that was an enormous hit at the time, the story revolves around dance hall girl Barbara Stanwyck who is romanced by wealthy businessman Ricardo Cortez (who was indecently handsome), but whose heart belongs to her bookish neighbor Monroe Owsley. She and Owsley marry, but keep it a secret, while she dismisses Cortez, who still holds out hope. She helps hubby get a job in Cortez's company, but married bliss quickly turns sour as Owsley develops a taste for the high life and steps out with a college sweetheart and gambles in high-stakes bridge (Yup! I know, it's pretty funny....). Finally he embezzles $5,000 from Cortez, and is about to go on the lam, when his devoted wife goes to Cortez....and I won't reveal anything else, although the ending was certainly a surprise.

Stanwyck is the best thing about this movie; in one of her earliest roles she's quite accomplished. Owsley is the weak point; he's unattractive and sniveling, while Cortez is amazingly suave and sexy, while his performance is earnest but unremarkable.

While ostensibly a drama, it's filled with laughs, many inadvertant as some elements of this movie have aged very poorly. But there are a lot of good witty lines; at one point Stanwyck says to Cortez, "My brains are in my feet, while yours are in...." That's pretty darn suggestive for 1931! There's a lot of bawdy and suggestive stuff in this flick, in the last days before the Code clamped down and whitewashed everything. An amusing antique, a good reminder of how far we haven't come in 70 years....this story could very easily be changed to fit 2003 but could keep the basic plot, with the original ending, in place.

Between the tacky title and the pre-Code year (1931), I was expecting a carload of cheap thrills. Happily, the first ten minutes does deliver. There's the tawdry lineup of taxi dancers waiting to get mauled; the over-loud bouncy band; and the tacky guys eager for ten cents of hard-boiled maybe's. Then there's the dressing room where the girls get to trade war stories and smooth out their nylons. No, it's not exactly the uptown social register, but it is colorful as heck. Plus, the slinky, gum-popping Stanwyck couldn't be more at home.

But then the story goes all soap-opera, as Barbara (Stanwyck) tries to hang onto her philandering husband, a very un-charismatic Eddie (Owsley), who also happens to steal from his employer (Cortez) who also happens to be an uptown socialite who also happens to have a yen for Barbara, of all people. Yes, it does get a little confusing. But hang on anyway, since our suddenly very faithful ex-taxi dancer has to suffer big time in order to deserve her eventual reward. I expect there wasn't a dry eye in the house.

No, I didn't get the cheap thrill carload I was hoping for. But Stanwyck does compensate for a lot. Plus I really liked the camaraderie amongst the girls, sort of like what you find among men in combat. But then I guess that fits. Anyhow, if you have a preference for weepies and gum-popping dames, this stone age talky fills the bill.

This movie begins in a night club called the "Palais de Dance" with a woman named "Barbara O'Neill" (Barbara Stanwyck) getting paid to dance with customers. As it turns out, her mind isn't in her work lately because she has just developed a crush on a man named "Eddie Miller" (Monroe Owsley) who resides in the same apartment complex as her. Unfortunately, Eddie is rather down on his luck and without steady employment plans to skip town soon. As luck would have it, however, a rich young man named "Bradley Carlton" (Ricardo Cortez) becomes quite inebriated and proceeds to give Barbara a large tip of $100--which she then passes along to Eddie to pay his bills. Not only that, but a day or two later she also convinces Bradley to hire Eddie at his firm as an accountant. In any case, one thing leads to another and eventually Eddie and Barbara get married which prompts Barbara to quit her job. Unfortunately, although they love each other Eddie gets discouraged about his work and tends to squander money in the stock market and cards. Unable to pay the bills, Barbara returns to the night club in secret to make a few bucks to make ends meet but it isn't nearly enough to pay off the substantial debts Eddie owes. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was a surprisingly pleasant film which still retains its charm after more than 85 years. I especially liked the acting of Barbara Stanwyck who really seemed well suited for this particular role. Admittedly, being an older film, this picture might not appeal to all viewers but regardless of that fact I enjoyed it and have rated it accordingly. Above average.