The Good Bad Girl

Films from the very early thirties needed a really good director otherwise they'd end up like this! This is and looks like a cheaply made "also ran" gangster picture from a director who didn't show he knew how to make a talking picture. To be fair to Roy William Neill, his budget was probably about $5 for this but even so, other people at Poverty Row studios made much more entertaining pictures than this.

He doesn't show anything different, imaginative or innovative. He turns what sounds an interesting story into something so boring you'll hate yourself for watching it. It just trapses like an unwelcome headache of grey monotone white noise through your brain.

The familiar story, the themes and the characters have all been explored much better in much better films than in this tiresome and clichéd colour by numbers z picture but it's not the actors' fault this is so dull, it's production quality. Take Mae Clarke, the star of this for example: in the same year this was made she was fabulous and led us all by the heartstrings in WATERLOO ROAD. She was also in the marvellous PUBLIC ENEMY and in FRANKENSTEIN. Two of these were directed by James Whale, the other by William Wellman - both talented and imaginative directors who knew exactly how to make great entertaining pictures with the advent of sound. Roy William Neil wasn't one of those super-talented directors of that era. Mae Clarke is given absolutely no personality in this. Whereas some other less than perfect directors made their films overly melodramatic, this guy does the opposite - there's absolutely no emotional engagement at all with our tragic heroine. Even in the most syrupy Helen Twelvetrees weepie you feel involved but with this you couldn't care less what happens to her.

There is however one, just one positive aspect about this and that's Paul Porcasi. He was one of the greatest "comedy" gangsters of all time. Robert Ellis, playing the other gangster however is almost as funny - but that's unintentional. His 'Dapper Dan' has to be the most unthreatening, pathetic gangsters ever to plague our screens. A perfect storm of appalling and bad acting make Dapper Dan almost embarrassing to watch. Marcia, our good bad girl decides to leave laughable gangster Dapper Dan for the usual clichéd rich guy on the other side of the tracks. This replacement boyfriend is apparently played by a different actor but since he looks absolutely identical and has as much acting ability, I think they may have scrimped a bit on their cast budget as well.

Mae Clarke will always be remembered as the girl whose face James Cagney shoved a grapefruit into in the same year's THE PUBLIC ENEMY. She will not be remembered for this weird little story about a a hood's girl who finds that her past will always be with her.

In some ways, this looks a bit antique for 1931, almost as if you are looking at 1928's famously inert LIGHTS OF NEW YORK. But don't be fooled. Although Ted Tetzlaff's photography is still in the big scenes, there's lots of movement, indicating distraction to the moviegoers in the set-ups to them. But in competition with the fast-paced stuff that it seems that everyone was doing at Warner's, this attempt to bring the woman's viewpoint into the genre as a tearjerker doesn't work, nor is Mae Clarke the actress to carry the effort.

What recommends this film are the performances of Mae Clarke and Marie Prevost as best friends in this tale of a gangster's moll trying to go straight. They made two other films at Columbia and their rapport was the best thing about all of them.

Now what is not so good. Let's start with the male leads. Robert Ellis is playing a gangster (Dan Tyler) and Mae Clarke is his gun moll, Marcia. When the movie begins Marcia says she wants out. In spite of Dapper Dan's grim pronouncement as to what will happen if she dumps him, she seems unafraid and even indifferent. And no wonder. Dapper Dan is one of the most unthreatening looking and sounding gangsters of all time. And maybe it is the early sound technology and maybe it is not, but Dapper Dan appears to speak with a bit of a lisp that is unintentionally hilarious.

But Dan turns out to be not that dapper after all. He goes to collect a debt and shoots a debtor in clear view AND earshot of others. The police are after him for this very clumsily executed crime. In the meantime we meet the guy Marcia is supposedly nuts over and who is the marrying kind. He appears to be a younger and more honest version of Dapper Dan Tyler - same non descript appearance and also with a bit of a lisp. This has to be the recording.

So this really turns into a paint by numbers script where all of the gangster/bad girl trying to go straight/unsympathetic rich in-law tropes go to die. Oh, and of course a baby has to be in the mix.

What else is bad? All of the fat jokes hurled at Marie Prevost courtesy of the screenwriters. I guess it's supposed to be funny that she is overweight and yet is always nagging her much older boyfriend to lose weight. Not really. It becomes tedious and is probably there to take up space.

This was probably made as a very B- effort precode at poverty row Columbia, and it is worth seeing for the female leads. But of everybody in this film Robert Ellis probably had the closest thing to a happy ending. Out of film roles by 1934, he reinvented himself and became a successful writer and director of B list films over at Fox.

Good Bad Girl, The (1931)

** (out of 4)

When people think of Mae Clarke and 1931 they'll probably think of three things. First would be James Cagney smashing a grapefruit in your face in THE PUBLIC ENEMY. Second would be the underrated masterpiece called WATERLOO BRIDGE. Third would be her getting chased by Boris Karloff in FRANKENSTEIN. Three masterpieces in one year is quite impressive so one can overlook this "other" film. Here she plays Marcia Cameron, a woman who finally catches a break and marries a good guy (James Hall) but her past is going to cost her everything. Her ex, a gangster (Robert Ellis), asks her to visit him in prison, which eventually leaks to the media and doesn't sit too well with the family of her new man. As the title says, this here is yet another tale of a bad girl with the heart of gold. Clarke is pretty good in the role but there are still quite a few problems with this film. The biggest one is Ellis who perhaps turns in the worst performance I've seen anyone give as a gangster. I've seen countless crime films in my life and I honestly can't think of anyone worst. Just check out the early scenes when he's threatening Clarke that she had better not be cheating on him. He's suppose to be menacing here but one can't help but laugh. Seeing him try to act rough and tough just had me wanting to break down laughing because of how forced it was. The supporting cast really isn't much better with Marie Prevost coming off quite annoying as Clarke's friend. The story is predictable from start to finish, although the sequence where Clarke's confronted by her new husband's parents was pretty good. It's also funny that one line goes: "My name is Bond...Trixie Bond."

Mae Clarke has the title role in this sob story about a well-intentioned woman who gets mixed up with a gangster and his troubles. When she wants to leave him, he lays down strict orders that he's the one who'll tell her when the affair is over.

Typical dialog has Clarke saying things like: "I'm a gangster's moll. I made a grab for happiness and it exploded in my face." That about sums up the meager plot.

Marie Prevost is the heroine's fast-talking, tough girlfriend who supplies most of the humor. James Hall is the man Clarke really loves and Robert Ellis is the gangster.

It's told in a brisk running time but comes across as little more than a fair programmer from Columbia but extremely dated.

Clarke is sincere and restrained as the woman who doesn't want to give up her baby, but it's strictly a routine melodrama with nothing new to offer. A weepie designated to reap tears from females especially.