Safe in Hell

I caught this film on TCM in Dec. of 2007. It was being shown as part of their William Wellman festival. I had not heard of it before, and didn't recognize any of the cast names. The story is a bout a woman accused of a murder in New Orleans, who is helped by her sailor boyfriend to an island in the Caribbean. This is a refuge for scoundrels and criminals. Romantically, the sailor marries her in a very private ceremony, and then he leaves her behind while he sails away for work. Clearly, the focus is on her, since he has very little screen time. The bulk of the film is the long time she has to wait for his return, fending of the lecherous advances of the motley criminals and a corrupt lawman. The ending was dark and surprisingly odd for any Hollywood film. And I was so surprised that I need to see it again, just to make sure I didn't imagine it. It is a somewhat slow film, but it is also intriguing in ways that only pre- code features can be. It seemed even modern in it's dark sensibilities. Also, the lead role, portrayed by Dorothy MacKaill, is a fascinating mix of spunky and trashy, showing more depth and complexity than one might expect from a standard H'wood feature. I'll be looking for her in other films. Definitely a noir predecessor. The black major-domo and the woman running the bar are terrific, too.

"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.

Plot-- A prostitute thinks she killed her cunning corrupter and flees to a Caribbean island to escape extradition, but not before marrying her departing sailor true love. Trouble is the island's full of lecherous men bent on nailing her, the island's only white woman. So should she risk staying or risk leaving.

That opening scene's a grabber that fairly shouts 'prostitute'. If it didn't help bring down Production Code censorship (1934), I don't know what would. Except for the goofy antics of the unshaven oglers, this 1931 cheapo almost amounts to a sleeper. Actress Mackail delivers the tough gal with soul, in spades. Too bad she's so obscure, her acting career mainly in silents. Here, she fends off the many lecherous men in convincing Joan Blondell style. And catch Charles Middleton in a surprisingly nuanced role; that is, a few years before his Ming The Merciless menaced Flash Gordon's serial universe. The movie's also distinguished by a surprise ending. But keep in mind that the subtext is about crime and redemption, along with true love. These themes are interwoven in subtle fashion such that the conclusion may prompt some thought.

Anyway, it's one of legendary director Wellman's early talkies, which in characteristic fashion he doesn't sentimentalize. And, oh yes, maybe my favorite scene is when the true lovers conduct their spooning through a fortunate crack in a shipping crate. Good thing she could get out before the cranes came. Note too, that the lovers' marriage is conducted without benefit of presiding cleric or official marriage certificate. Yet the couple treat their enduring love as all the ceremony they need. Thus church and government are bypassed as unnecessary despite long tradition and heavy legalisms. No wonder the screenplay is pre-Code. All in all, the 70-minutes is definitely meaningful and worth thinking about. So catch up with it despite the long ago era.

A case can be made that director William Wellman did his best work at Warner Bros-First National from 1931-1933. "Safe in Hell" is a prime example. There isn't much plot in this saga of a "bad" woman (Mackaill) redeemed by love, but the atmosphere of sin, desperation , and hope is efficiently evoked. The compositions are continually inventive, and the camera movements are as energizing as Wellman pulled off the same year in "The Public Enemy". He also coaxed fine work from the beautiful Mackaill; it's telling that this tough guy director seemed to work so well with actresses. In his Warner Bros. tenure, Wellman did great films with Barbara Stanwyck, Loretta Young, and Ruth Chatterton, too. Look up his resume, and check out the films.