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Barbary Coast (1935)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

Masterful acting highlight this overlooked gem that features just about everything you'd want out of a classic from the Golden Era of movies. Miriam Hopkins plays a poor girl from New York who travels to San Francisco to marry a man she's never met but once she arrives she learns that he has been murdered. Since she didn't love him, she decides to team up with the man responsible for his death, a ruthless casino owner (Edward G. Robinson) who wants to keep the town under his rule. Soon the woman begins to have second thoughts after meeting young man (Joel McCrea) from her old hometown. Hawks has a big following today and many consider him one of the greatest director's of all time but I'm really not sure I'd join such high praise. I did find it rather strange that when people mention his work this title is often left out, which is too bad because I found this to be one of the most entertaining of his career even though he did take the picture over from William Wyler. Some have called this LITTLE CAESAR set during the gold rush and that might be a fair saying but you could also mix in another Robinson picture, THE HATCHET MAN. This film here is pulp entertainment from start to finish as we have three legends really giving it their all in a pretty good story that contains romance, action, drama, comedy and one masterfully directed sequence. This sequence takes place as a vigilante group is holding a trial while walking through some mud. The sound effects used here and the constant editing down towards the mud is priceless and will certainly remain in the viewers mind long after the film ends. Robinson dives head first into his role and really delivers one of the finest performances of his career. His scenes where the character goes mad or better yet, love struck, are priceless and really pack a nice little punch as he goes off the deep end. The evilness Robinson brings to the role was not only creepy but it added to the entertainment value just because it will also put a smile on your face. Hopkins is also terrific and manages to deliver a full performance full of all sorts of emotions. Her character goes through various stages and the actress captures all of them perfectly. Her and Robinson have wonderful chemistry and I was shocked to learn after the movie that the two hated working with one another on this film. McCrea is also terrific and plays the naive and soft-spoken character wonderfully. The supporting cast features the wonderful Walter Brennan, Frank Craven, Brian Donlevy, Harry Carey and Donald Meek. The film's biggest problem is the ending, which really felt added on but I haven't been able to find anywhere that it was forced by the studio. Why this film isn't better known is beyond me but there's enough packed in here for two movies so hopefully more people will check it out.

Walter Brennan plays "Old Atrocity," and he brings a lot of comedy to this lively drama doing his signature old codger (never mind he was 41 at the time). Also fun, of course, is the MacArthur/Hecht screenplay, which actually manages to capture the outlaw feeling of Gold Rush days at the Golden Gate. Moody lighting and foggy sets help.

But I enjoyed "Barbara Coast" for something else entirely: the pairing of Edward G. Robinson and Joel McRea. Both are among the most attractive film actors of all time - but for reasons as different as they are.

Short (5'5"), dark, raised in Bucharest and New York City, Edward G. (for Goldenberg) Robinson looks nothing like a matinée idol. Nevertheless, he didn't just star in films, he commanded the screen, even when his co-star was Bogart or Sinatra. He mastered as wide a variety of roles as anyone, ever. Famous for violent gangsters ("Little Caesar"), but he was every bit as good as a tragic lead ("Bullets for Ballots") or a comic lead ("Larceny, Inc."); a villain ("Key Largo"), a dupe ("Scarlett Street"), a hero ("Night has a Thousand Eyes"); a historic figure (Dr. Paul Ehrlich); and finally character actor ("Double Indemnity"). The list is almost endless-- except for musicals-- because his career spanned seven decades.

I'll watch Robinson in anything.

Tall (6'3"), blond and blue-eyed, born in Southern California, Joel McRea is as gorgeous a man as ever faced a camera-but he had very little range. He could affect a few things-- steely determination, boyish charm, and thoughtful confusion were comfort zones-- but his face almost never changed except to smile a bit from time to time. Never mind; he was a precursor to very, very long list of pretty boys who became competent actors, from Valentino through Errol Flynn and Steve McQueen to Brad Pitt.

I'll watch McRea in anything, too.

Enjoyable adventure is filmed at a lively clip and delivers a fine entertainment. A bit heavy on the ham in a couple of places but entertaining nonetheless. Edward G.Robinson is fine as always although he should have rethought the earring. He is full of brio and shows his versatility but his costume does him no favors. He and Miriam are a fine pair even though he despised her offscreen. A good actress if a bit dithery she managed to destroy her starring career with cheap tricks and constant attempts to upstage her co-stars. The story goes that Edward G. became fed up with it and when the script called for him to strike her he was so frustrated with her shenanigans that he didn't pull the slap and sent her flying to the applause of the assembled crew.

Apparently Sam Goldwyn picked the words Barbary Coast as a title then called in his writers and told them to write a story. That was the way they did things at Hollywood studios in the thirties.

This is actually a pretty entertaining movie that catches some of the anything goes atmosphere of San Francisco in gold rush days.Edward G. Robinson is miscast (and has to wear some peculiar costumes) in his role as a bad guy but he gives it everything he's got and some of his scenes are quite effective. Miriam Hopkins is very good as a gold digger of the non mining kind and Joel Mcrea as her hearts desire spouts some poetic dialogue quite eloquently.

Good drama of the typically Hollywood kind.

Censors had a profound influence in shaping movies during the Golden Age of Hollywood. No better example was Samuel Goldwyn's October 1935 "Barbary Coast." Joseph Breen, chief censor for the Production Code Administration (PCA), hated unredeemable characters in movies that made them out as heroes. When he received Goldwyn's initial script for the Howard Hawks-directed film, Breen rolled his eyes and described it as "one of sordidness, and low-tone morality." The adapted screenplay from Herbert Asbury's 1933's 'Barbary Coast: An Informal History of the San Francisco Underworld,' was about the city's red light district in the 1850. A film industry trade magazine writer familiar with Asbury's book concurred with Breen, calling it "one of the filthiest, vilest and most degrading books that have ever been chosen for the screen."

Goldwyn hired several writers to assist Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur in delivering a screenplay the PCA would pass. Several rewrites sanitized the pair's first script, upsetting Hecht to the point he described it as "Miriam Hopkins (Mary Rutledge in the movie) came to the Barbary Coast and wandered around like a confused Goldwyn girl." Finally, after several months of going back and forth, changing "Barbary Coast" into a romance, Breen beamed to his boss Will Hays the script contains a "fine, clean girl," where there's no mention of "unpleasant details of prostitution." He described the screenplay "now has a full, and completely compensating, value, the finest and most intelligent picture I have seen in many months."

After viewing the final product, some contemporary critics saw just the opposite, with Time Magazine writing the movie was "painfully uninspired," while Newsweek said the plot in the original book was thrown away. Modern day reviewer Stacia Jones agrees "Barbary Coast" would have been a far different, and better, film if it had been made during the Pre-Code era, but "despite some general flakiness and the unmistakable hint of changes made to appease moralists, the script is pretty solid."

"Barbary Coast" is also known for the outrageous behavior Hopkins displayed to her leading man Edward G. Robinson on the set. Miss Rutledge (Hopkins) journeys to San Francisco to marry a rich gold miner she knows. Trouble is, he lost all his money to a casino owned by Louis Chamalis (Robinson) and commits suicide. The resigned Rutledge eventually works at the casino's crooked roulette wheel, where Chamalis falls for her. Robinson described working with Hopkins 'a horror." He claimed she was always late, keeping the film crew waiting, she repeatedly tried to upstage the other actors, and she was constantly haughty. Hopkins didn't read her lines as any actress should when Robinson's close-ups were filmed; she had a script girl stand in for her to read them while Edward always read his lines to her. For one scene, Robinson wanted to rehearse where he had to slap her in the face so he wouldn't actually hit her. She refused, demanding they just shoot it once with him really slapping her and then be done with it. Robinson wrote in his memoirs, "I slapped her so you could hear it all over the set. And the cast and crew burst into applause," apparently tired of Hopkins' behavior. The actress had to pick herself up from the floor, so hard was Robinson's slap.

Initially Walter Brennan, whose acting career saw him in brief roles, was given yet another short part in "Barbary Coast" as Old Atrocity, a regular presence in the district's saloons. Hawks loved Brennan's acting so much the director expanded his lines in several scenes where the actor's trademark excitability is on full display. The movie turned out to be his first significant role after ten years slogging in numerous Hollywood films. He began to get larger parts after the movie's release. "That really set me up," claimed Brennan, the winner of three Academy Awards, and is tied with Jack Nicholson and Daniel Day-Lewis for the most Oscars for an actor.