Unashamed

One of the Interesting Things about Pre-Code Films is, of course, the Frankness and Non-Skirting way the Story and Dialog go about the Business of such things as Pre-Marital or Promiscuous Sex. It's just there, not Avoided like Post-Hays Movies. Here it is Actually the Central Part of the Storyline as the "in love" Couple check in to a Hotel.

The Next Morning, after Making Whoopee the Lovers use this as a Way to get Her Father to "force" Them to Marry (something the Dad did not want), because it is the Accepted Thing to do. But if that isn't Complicated Enough, Enter a "Loving" Brother who Despises His Sister's Cad Boyfriend and then there are Fireworks.

The Remainder of the Movie is set in a Courtroom where things get a bit Dicey about the Spicey Love Making and Crime. The Movie has a 1932 Mindset and looking at it Today might seem Difficult or a bit Strange with all the Talk about Unwritten Law and so forth, and the Ending may come Across as a Little more than Strange.

Overall it is Worth a Watch for the Dated Dialog, Social Mores, Incestual Overtones, and the Bizarre Conclusion.

Harry Swift (Monroe Owsley) is an awful young man...and without an ounce of character. He's been spoiled his entire life by his idiot father (Jean Hersholt) and he's been wooing Joan Ogden (Helen Twelvetrees). His interest isn't strictly honorable, as his interest really is in her money as she comes from a wealthy family. When his father learns of their relationship, he approaches Joan's father and tells him that his son is just no good. Not surprisingly, Joan's father forbids her from marrying Harry. As for Joan's brother, Dick (Robert Young) he knows Harry and thinks he's a cad. So to try to force them to allow the marriage, Harry spends the night with Joan...in a hotel room (after all, this is a Pre-Code picture)! Despite that, the family still won't budge...they won't condone this awful marriage. In fact, the brother is so against the marriage that he kills Harry! Soon Dick is on trial for his life...and Joan seems oddly indifferent to his fate.

This is a very strange movie in that you see Dick murder Harry. Sure, Harry was a terrible person but the film seems to imply that Dick and his lawyer lying in court was okay and that Joan SHOULD have lied for Dick! That's all very weird...as is Dick's almost incestuous feelings towards his sister. What's weirder? Joan doing a 180 late in the film...and not conceivable reason for this. Overall, a strange, muddled plot...though the film is oddly entertaining despite the writing and overly dramatic moments. In essence, it's watchable and enjoyable crap.

By the way, it's odd that Robert Young's character was referred to as a boy! In one scene, someone even says "...the boy is a minor"...and yet Young was 25 when he made this film.

Anyone interested in early 1930s American society should watch this. Whilst the story is mind blowing, the execution of this picture is well below par for an MGM production. It's got quite a cheap feel to it so it's nothing like as good as it could have been. Nevertheless it throws such disturbing social inequality and hypocrisy at you that you'll still be shouting angrily at your screen.

Veteran director Harry Beaumont was still well respected in 1932 but by now not the most innovative or imaginative guy on the lot. Apart from the bubbling fountain at the start, this suffers from rather stagey direction and some of the bit parts are surely cardboard cut outs aren't they? Bayard Veiller wrote some absolutely superb films in the early thirties. His script for this however lacks his usual flair for realism - it's based on his own play and he didn't seem to make too much of an effort to convert this into a movie. This coupled with Beaumont's old fashioned style results in a slightly theatrical feel. So we've got dull direction, some poor acting, unrealistic dialogue but these aren't the main problem with this - what's wrong with this film is it's a fascinating glimpse into the hypocritical morals and attitudes of the early thirties but it doesn't criticise them or try to explain or even comment on them, it just says what was happening without saying why. But maybe I've seen to many "campaigning" Warner Brothers pictures which went in for that sort of thing........and indeed they also made a film inspired by this same "honour" murder case TWO AGAINST THE WORLD in the same year but they completely squandered their opportunity by making a mushy romantic melodrama out of it. This version is not a mushy romantic melodrama!

You've read what this is about and as I've said, this isn't the greatest example of filmmaking but it's OK. What makes this fascinating viewing is its take on the morality of the age.

Bearing in mind the relaxed approach to what constituted decent behaviour in the years following The Great War in many strands of society, it would be nice to think that this is highlighting the hypocrisy of that era's morality. In reality however it just seems to be reinforcing those puritanical attitudes, the fake facade of decency which society pretended existed. This film should have a message but it doesn't - it's just reporting the situation.

What you pick up from watching films from this period is the "unwritten law" that if a girl slept with a man she would without any hesitation have to marry him. That was just the way things were.....apparently? The crux of this film is that Helen Twelvetrees' character professes to have had sex with someone but didn't want to marry him! Shock horror! We're expected to think that this was utterly unbelievable, that the population would be outraged by this proof of how wanton and disgraceful women could be! But this was at the end of the roaring twenties......yet this film is based on actual real events....it hardly seems like planet Earth does it! The title of this refers to the fact that she unashamedly admits to sleeping with a man, out of wedlock. This makes her so utterly loathsome and despised by all decent people you'd think she was a child murderer. But all she's done is said that marriage is old fashioned and she doesn't see that having unmarried sex is a big deal. It is beyond bizarre to us these days that this would cause such unmitigated disgust and sheer hatred.

Nobody however seem to bat an eyelid that Joan and her brother Dick are clearly having an incestuous relationship (well the critics certainly did at the time). Veiller and Beaumont make this very obvious right from the start with the "amusing confusion" of the opening scene. That goes some way to explain Dick's incendiary jealousy of his sister's lover. When you re-watch this - and yes, you will because there's so much going on, you'll begin to think that I underestimated these filmmakers: there's just so much going and although it's from the pre-code era there are certain things which still must remain unspoken - maybe they're allowing you to fill in the gaps yourself. It's certainly multi-layered!

In "The Unashamed" the Ogdens are a wealthy family that is very close and loving. Jean falls in love with a crass fortune hunter named Harry Swift who is obviously after her money. Her father and brother try everything to dissuade her. To force the issue, Harry persuades Jean to spend the night in a hotel with him (horrors!) When they fling this unheard of behavior in the face of her father and brother, to induce them to consent to marriage, things go badly. Jean's brother Dick shoots and kills Swift. However, Dick wants only to protect Jean's honor so he insists to his defense lawyer, Trask, that Jean be kept out of it completely.

The latter half of the movie consists of Dick's trial, and Trask's problem in trying to save Dick from the electric chair while protecting his wishes not to tell the real story of what happened. Thus Trask is not allowed to use the "unwritten law" as a defense (that's the one that allows husbands to kills their wives and wives' lovers). In addition, Jean is extremely bitter toward her father and brother since they've ruined her happiness. So she's not about to cooperate in the defense. Until...

This picture is extremely melodramatic, in a style which seems rather alien to us today, and a lot of the acting and dialogue is too stagy for our taste. Nevertheless, for its time, it was quite well done. The issues of class, honor and gender that the film raises may seem quaint but there were very real to rich people of the 20's and 30's. Similarly, the courtroom scenes are quite well executed with a real attempt to observe appropriate legal proecdures. The ultimate twist ending is also quite effective and will remind you of a more recent (and classic) courtroom movie.

Helen Twelvetrees loves Monroe Owlsley, who adores her, or at least the three million dollars she stands to inherit. He inveigles her to go to a hotel with him; her brother, Robert Young, finds out about it, tries to prevent her, and winds up shooting Owlsley. He is placed on trial for murder.

I think there are some fine performances here, in what is essentially a stage play. Miss Twelvetress plays the nitwit very well, expressing her spoiled character well. Monroe Owlsey plays his cut-rate Lowell Sherman rotter very well; his scenes with father Jean Hersholt are heart-breaking in his manipulation of the sentimental old man. Robert Young, as the murderer is appropriately callow.

The value of this movie, ninety years later, is showing people trapped in their own little society, secure in the mistaken belief that they are invulnerable. Not a one of them can conceive of any bad consequences to their selfish, thoughtless actions. I doubt that a modern audience would take that message away from the film. Many pre-codes seem to concern a society so alien to modern thoughts that one has to dig to get any instruction from them. Still, under the direction of the highly capable Harry Beaumont, every actor inhabits his character fully.