The Flapper

I believe that all 3 of the comments for The Flapper were written by men, who didn't rate it very high. This movie was obviously made to appeal to the women, or more appropriately girls, of the day. I'm a girl and I rate it very high. The Flapper is an adorable movie about a teenage schoolgirl, Ginger King (Olive Thomas), who dreams of lovers and jazz cabarets, wanting to escape her mundane life at boarding school and ride off into the sunset with the handsome older man all the schoolgirls are in love with, Richard Channing (William P. Carleton). She fools Channing into thinking she's 20, and he takes her to a country club, but her "romantic night" is ruined when the bad girl (though she looks to be 40!) at school, Hortense, gets in her way. Throughout the rest of the film, Ginger pursues her dreams and visits 1920's nightclubs, wears glamorous clothes, but finds that being a flapper is not easy when she gets involved in a mysterious jewel heist and more! The Flapper is all fluff, but so cute! Olive Thomas shows a definite comedic flair in this movie, and it's so sad that she didn't get to go on with her career. The Flapper is a treasure, not just because of it's one of Olive Thomas' few surviving movies, but because it's a good, solid silent comedy that any silent film fan should see (whether you like chick flicks or not).

In "Orange Springs" (a small town in Florida), "Girls who hobnobbed at the soda fountain were talked about." Perhaps this is why beautiful young Olive Thomas (as Genevieve "Ginger" King) sips soda with boastful boyfriend Theodore Westman Jr. (as William "Bill" E. Forbes) on her estate. They must part company as Ms. Thomas is sent to a boarding school in a snowy town near New York. Coincidently, Mr. Westman has enrolled in a military academy next to the girls' boarding school. If you've seen movies like this, you already know all-girl schools and orphanages are often built next to all-male institutions.

Thomas makes friends easily, including moth-like Katherine Johnson (as Hortense) and social butterfly Norma Shearer (as an extra with a lot of screen time). The young women like to watch men. Their favorite is mysterious and romantic Wm. P. Carlton Jr. (as Richard Channing), an older guy who rides by on a horse regularly. Thomas and her friends fantasize the horseman is a professional gambler, actor or wife-beater. Thomas thinks she's falling in love with Mr. Carlton. She puts on fun clothes to become a "flapper" and is mistaken for a bad woman. The 1920s would be known for "flappers" like Colleen Moore and Clara Bow.

"The Flapper" was written by Frances Marion, who was then writing scenarios for Mary Pickford. This film may have, in some level of development, been considered a Pickford vehicle; and, it's easy to imagine her in the lead. For whatever reasons, Thomas got the assignment. It was kept in the family, as Olive Thomas was then Mrs. Pickford (married to Jack Pickford, Mary's brother). The film is fairly routine for the time, but has been elevated due to appearing with the title "The Flapper". Thomas could be considered more a proto-type than a real flapper. Later, Cyndi Lauper (see "Girls Just Want to Have Fun") was more of a flapper.

One of the best things about watching Alan Crosland adeptly direct this film is that the picture is so well preserved. Apparently the beginning and ending title/credits are damaged or missing, but the bulk of the film looks very pleasing. It's also worth noting that Thomas, who is charming throughout, died in September 1920, the same week as Robert Harron; the young stars' shocking and mysterious deaths shook what were arguably the two biggest film families in Hollywood at the time (actress Mary Pickford and director D.W. Griffith). Young co-stars Theodore Westman Jr. and Bobby Connelly also died tragically young.

****** The Flapper (5/10/20) Alan Crosland ~ Olive Thomas, Theodore Westman Jr., William P. Carleton, Norma Shearer

this is the best film Olive Thomas ever did IMHO. Easily!, Im won over now on her persona. It's directed by one of the best directors of the silent era Alan Crosland. This is a wonderfully preserved homage to both Thomas as an actress & Crosland as director. The original & wonderfully drawn Selznick intertitles are intact in this wonderful story by Frances Marion. The film is so well preserved and crystal clear with almost no nitrate deterioration whatsoever. Early scenes are shot in Florida & we se Olive in an expressive traveling shot proceeding up a canal in a motor launch. Olive Thomas is a cross between both Mary Pickford & Marguerite Clark in girlishness. What a pity that Thomas died not long after wrapping this movie. Without giving any plot away, Thomas is sent to a girls school in snow country in the mountains. A boys school is nearby. Shenanigans continue with the beautiful mountain scenery as a back drop. Alan Crosland was as much a pictorilist as Rex Ingram or Ernst Lubitsch. A previous film of Crosland's thats on home video is "The Unbeliever" from 1918 made at the Edison Studios. Both films exhibit his visual style soon to be famous in films like "Don Juan", "The Beloved Rogue" & "The Jazz Singer". Norma Shearer, later a famous MGM star, is visible in this film and is only 17 years old. This movie has nothing to do with Flappers as personified later in the 20s. No bathtub gin or any of that. Frances Marion who wrote this story seems to have chosen a random word for the title of the story.

The radiantly beautiful Olive Thomas is just about believable as sixteen- year-old Genevieve King, although she was actually 24 or 25 at the time. It seems certain that the common, early movie practice of chest-strapping was used here. In the movie, in spite of the title, Olive plays what was known as a 'Baby Vamp'.

Genevieve is a bored upper-crust girl, who lives in a classic plantation mansion, well provided with colored servants. Unfortunately, the flighty, potentially vampish, teenager, was prone to disappearing with a male friend, and, after being double-crossed by a governess, father packs her off to a girl's boarding school. Here she falls in with some unsavory schoolgirls, and is easily led into being a naughty girl….one who is keen to attach herself to a particular adult man whom she informs that she is 'about twenty' and not sixteen as she's meant to be in the film.

After many adventures and a ridiculous suicide attempt, Genevieve decides to transform herself into a flapper, although, in her new garb, she is not girly enough to be a flapper of the 1920s. It seems 1920 was a transitional year during which the line between vamp, flapper and even diva was blurred. Flapper, however, was the 'in' term.

Snow scenes always work well in black and white film, and the scene with the horse drawn sleigh and girls sledging is no exception. The scene where the girls turn over their sledges at speed on a downhill run is not as comical as it seems. These extras were in fact badly injured in the shoot, and they filled the local hospital with their broken bodies.

Ginger-haired, violet-eyed Olive Thomas (nee Duffy) was of Irish descent, and became the wife of Jack Pickford (brother of Mary). She had been in the Zeigfield Folies before entering the movies, but it was while on a European tour with Jack that she somehow ingested a solution of bichloride of mercury. It may have been accidental or, perhaps, suicide. She died five days later, leaving Jack devastated, although sister Mary seemed unconcerned for the 'World's Sweetheart' (Mary was only 'America's sweetheart'). One person who was concerned was Mabel Normand, a good friend of Jack. It seems Mabel never met Olive, but had a signed photo of the Baby Vamp in her dressing room and an album of her photos at home. After Olive died, Mabel spent many hours sitting with her grieving mother, and always remained very angry about the circumstances of Ollie's death. Jack Pickford built a mausoleum in New York and had Ollie interred within it. This had the Pickford name inscribed over its doorway, but no other Pickford was ever buried there. We can assume that the sweet Mary, who didn't bother to attend the funeral, saw to that.

Olive seems very modern-looking in her films, and very unlike, say, Mabel Normand who was an entrenched Edwardian. Ollie could easily be cast in a picture today, whereas Mabel is clearly the face of the 1890s (producers have never found any modern actress Mablescent enough to portray her accurately). The World's Sweetheart would undoubtedly have gone on to play more mature, womanly roles had she lived, while Miss Normand and Miss Pickford were hamstrung by their child-like appearance (off-screen as well as on-screen).

Dame Ginger is a youngster who lives in a boring provincial town, Orange Springs; due to her behavior and yearnings for a thrilling life, her father decides to send her to a boarding school, the kind of place where the upper class girls of the 20's learn to do important things like skiing or flirting, the last habit always with the supervision of a chaperon. In such an idle but strict place, and thanks to some adventures ( she falls in love with a mysterious adult man and will be involved in a robbery ) Ginger will have finally the chance to make her most inward dream come true, to be a genuine flapper.

Herr Alan Crosland 's direction of this film is remarkable ( even though Crossland later will betray the rules of the silent cinema, by directing the first talkie in film history ) because in this early 20's film the technique, continuity and rhythm are developed in an especially suitable way for a romantic comedy. The star is Dame Olive Thomas, an actress who died early and who shows in this film her versatility by playing a character with different shades, an innocent girl transformed into a flapper. In this excellent film restoration there are is also a collection of witty, funny and politically incorrect intertitles that were enjoyed by this stiff German aristocrat thanks to their irony and longhaired impudence.

And now, if you'll allow me, I must temporarily take my leave because this German Count has an appointment with a vamp, a more dangerous woman than a flapper.

Herr Graf Ferdinand Von Galitzien http://ferdinandvongalitzien.blogspot.com/