Amor libre

Bette Davis plays Helen Bauer, a woman who does not want to get married and be tied down to one man. However she does have a lover named Don Peterson(Gene Raymond). He persuades her to marry him. They do and things rapidly fall apart.

Once considered pretty shocking this is tame by todays standards. The discussions about love and sex are actually quite funny in this day and age. But the movie moves quickly (it's only a little over an hour) and Davis and Raymond play off each other very well. Davis in later years bad-mouthed this film but it's actually pretty good. Worth catching.

100 years after her birth, in 2008, to the credit of the greatest actor of the 20th century, it's impossible to separate the personal empowerment of Bette Davis' viewers from societies becoming more gender & sexually egalitarian.

"Ex-Lady" is the film version of an unperformed (1931) play "Illicit." By 1933, the blatant sexuality of "Ex-Lady" was close to being considered censor-able. Warner Bros'. production explores the subject of open marriage way before it was popular. Brazen director, French Robert Florey accentuates the acute blend of delicious dialog, succinct script, on-point performances & sensual cinematography.

Helen Bauer (Bette Davis at 25yo) is a sexy, fashion illustrator. Don Peterson (Gene Raymond at 22yo) is an advertising executive who's proposed marriage to Helen; but, she initially refuses not wanting to give up her independence. Much to the chagrin of Helen's overly moralistic father, Adolphe Bauer (Alphonso Ethier), the unwed couple is obviously having a live-in sexual relationship. Had this film been released later, these sexual aspects of an unwed relationship would've been censor-able due to the Hayes Code.

What's more, after Miss Bauer eventually becomes Mrs. Peterson, Helen's reluctance to marry comes across like the woman has intuition, when her husband begins a sexual flirtation with the bored, flapper wife, Iris Van Hugh (Claire Dodd), of his alcoholic business rival, Hugo Van Hugh (Frank McHugh). When Helen tries to platonically date a handsome rouge, Nick Malvyn (Monroe Owsley), he unsuccessfully attempts to make an adulteress of her!

Several examples of delightful dialog make my points plain:

Don (Raymond): "I'm just about fed up with sneaking in...let's get married so I'll have the right to be with you." Helen (Davis): "What do you mean 'right'? I don't like the word 'right'." Don: "Let's not quibble about words." Helen: "No, I'm not quibbling, 'right' means something. No one has any 'rights' about me, except me."

Helen soft & sincerely conveys what Bette Davis believed: women are men's equals. Part of the reason such films appeal(ed) to Davis' audiences so much is because she portrays empowered women. Helen 'says without saying' that she has the 'right' not to get married & enjoy her sexuality, too (in 1933!).

When Helen (Davis) says: "I don't want babies," Davis commented later in her life (1971), there'd be fewer divorces if couples didn't marry simply to have sex & babies. If her point, that couples who get married ought to do so because they are very strongly committed to one another, hasn't been socially adopted in the US yet, & couples still wed for moralistic reasons, Davis' Helen conveys a higher moral reason for marriage: a feminist one that holds very heavy weight today, since equality between women & men is all the more prevalent, as this early 20th century dialog reveals:

Don (Raymond): "You're a successful woman; I ought not to like it." Helen (Davis): "You're a pretty successful man; I ought not to like it." Don & Helen simultaneously: "I'm a man!"

As usual, Bette Davis' unique set of physical & verbal expressions convey a woman's power; this time without disempowering her man. This remains her appeal to women & men: as a woman's role model who is eventually actualized & an independent woman who men do love. In this sense, Bette Davis' characters, as role models of empowered women, have far reaching effects upon changing the social status of women to be equal to men and reveals that men do like it.

Bette Davis is a free-spirited, cool-as-a-cucumber commercial artists who keeps rebuffing marriage proposals from her boyfriend, the owner of an advertising agency. Why? Because she thinks marriage will lose its spark. Complacency and boredom will settle in, and then what. Bette's character eventually relents, but her reservations prove accurate. Gene Raymond plays the love interest, and he's quite good, a character who is serious and has gravitas.

The cast includes Frank McHugh as a stuffed shirt seemingly oblivious to the attentions of his gorgeous wife, played by Claire Dodd. Monroe Owsley and Kay Strozzi also give good turns as glamorous society types who come between Davis and Raymond. Ex-Lady is not so much sexually suggestive as sexually obvious. Even by pre-code standards, not much is left to the imagination. Bette Davis looks beautiful; cinematographer Tony Gaudio captures her ethereal beauty, something Warner Brothers boss Jack Warner failed to appreciate. Clocking in at 67 minutes, Ex-Lady doesn't overstay its welcome.

Well, well, imagine my surprise when I saw two people in a double bed. That's right - precode, no whitewash.

Bette Davis and Gene Raymond star in "Ex-Lady," about talented illustrator Helen Bauer, a career girl with very definite ideas about marriage - she's against it. Don (Raymond) has a key to her apartment, but he finally talks her into marriage.

After a wonderful Havana honeymoon, the two return to find his ad agency, at which she now works, is in shambles. The two seem to grow unhappier until they decide it's just not working.

But while separated, he and Helen find that the emotions they thought they left behind in marriage are still very much present.

I wasn't as enthusiastic about "Ex-Lady" as some of the other posters. It's slow-moving and stagy. It's based on an unproduced play, and it's not hard to see why it wasn't produced.

Still, it's fascinating - Davis is all of about 28, tiny and pretty, and her screen persona is as yet unset. The feminist premise is very interesting, as are all of the precode elements.

Davis and Raymond display quite a bit of chemistry, and talk about not having your screen persona - Frank McHugh wanders around as if he's on another planet! There's also a rendition of a cut version of Wagner's "Dich, teure Halle" at a party.

Davis does fine in her role, but of course, this isn't the type of thing she would shine in once Warners caught on. Raymond has never impressed me much, but if Jeannette MacDonald was forced to marry him, apparently he impressed Louis B. Mayer.

All in all, "Ex-Lady" is worth seeing for early Davis and as a pre-code film, which makes some of the movie seem quite modern.

'Ex-Lady's' reviews here are mixed, some liking/loving it and others not caring for it. Both sides understandable. My main reasons for seeing it were for Bette Davis (whoo always was a great actress, her performance in 'All About Eve' in particular is a favourite), in an early role when her career was more variable, and for the unconventional and ahead of the time subject matter (back when films got away with more before the code was enforced) which would be an interest point really for any film buff.

By all means 'Ex-Lady' is not one of Davis' best films, nowhere near close, she herself did not think so. To me though, it is still a very interesting film (one of her more interesting early films) and a very enjoyable one that does deserve to be better known, if mainly for curiosity and historical value. Both as a Davis completest, or at least trying to see as many of her films as possible, and to see how films were pre-code and were able to take more risks.

Did think that it was a bit stagy in spots and that the drama could have opened up more.

Also Kay Strozzi overdoes it dreadfully, not funny or endearing at all and quite annoying. The ending felt a bit on the pat side.

However, Davis, although she would give much better performances later when the quality of her films became more consistent in a good way, shows a deft comic touch and totally at ease with her material. Gene Raymond shares a witty but also surprisingly tender at times chemistry with her and although his presence isn't quite as arresting he is certainly not as bland as he could be. Frank McHugh brings a lot of energy to his role as does a wonderfully snide Monrow Owsley. The direction is hardly indifferent and makes great use of Davis.

The dialogue is full of snap and sizzle, witty but also sophisticated, while the story makes the most of the unconventional subject with a fair share of daring moments, in a way one is surprised that such an early film got away with what it contains. The production values are tasteful and elegant, though the photography could have been a little more refined in places, standing out especially are Davis' clothes which are things of beauty.

Overall, not great but enjoyable fun and wonderfully ahead of its time. 7/10