Nuit après nuit

Night After Night is a very amusing gangster spoof comedy from the early talkie era. Best remembered as Gorge Raft's first starring role and Mae West's introductory movie role -- as if she needed any introduction! Nevertheless, this unambitious little movie stands on its own, tightly directed by Archie Mayo, beautifully filmed by cinematographer Ernest Haller, and well acted by the entire cast. The dialog is snappy with lots of funny lines, and the musical score, which seems to be that naturally produced by the bands in the speakeasy setting, stays in the background but enhances the light-hearted, devil-may-care Prohibition ambiance. Released in late 1932, this picture looks and sounds very sophisticated technically, showing in what a short time the industry had overcome the problems of creaky early sound equipment.

Raft, the owner of a high-class speak, is admiring from afar, and in fact has rather foolishly fallen in love with, a classy-looking "Park Avenue dame" (Constance Cummings) who frequents his joint, sitting all by herself and looking dreamy. Because he knows he's a no-class mug, he hires a stuffy old school teacher (Alison Skipworth) to teach him how to get some -- class, that is. It's a hopeless case of course, but Raft manages to get a date with the swell broad anyway, mainly because the building his joint occupies was once her girlhood home. The brew is stirred by a rival gang trying to horn in on his operation, a pistol-packing, madly jealous ex-moll (Wynne Gibson), and Raft's cynical henchman (Roscoe Karns) grousing about the entire proceeding. Raft thinks he has it going swimmingly with the swell dame when he gets her to dinner at his joint, especially since he has his tutor Skipworth at the table to give him moral support and keep his shaky class from slipping. The party gets livelier when it is crashed by another of his old flames, that moll of molls Mae West. The inimitable Mae works her very bad influence to get the school teacher roaring drunk.

Those to whom this is the first Mae West movie, may wonder why there was so much fuss over her. Sure, her two best assets -- the ones the inflatable life preserver was named for -- look great in a see-though negligee, but she's still a chubby middle-aged woman. Well, stick around. She would have probably said something like, "It ain't what ya got, it's how you carry it." Mae's role here is a supporting one. She doesn't show up until the midway point and has only a couple of scenes, but as George Raft reportedly complained, "She stole everything but the cameras!" Raft and Cummings are okay in the leads, both charming in fact. But it is the supporting cast that shines in this little jewel. Mae West is Mae West, and Roscoe Karns is Roscoe Karns at his best. Yet Alison Skipworth as the stuffy but lovable old schoolmarm practically steals the show, as she did nearly every movie she was in. She even keeps up with Mae West in the scene-stealing game. Here's a hot tip for you little mugs and mollies who are new to the racket of watching beautiful, old black and white movies -- you can't go wrong if you make a point to never miss an Alison Skipworth picture!

Night After Night is slick, solid, Old Hollywood entertainment all the way.

While I enjoyed “The Mae West Glamour Collection” more than I expected to, I decided to leave her debut film for last, knowing that it wouldn’t be a typical vehicle of hers since she wasn’t the lead; I also figured it would be, as Leonard Maltin bluntly puts it, “a crashing bore”. However, I was quite surprised by how engaging and entertaining it all was – if, by no means, a classic. The film, in fact, is an agreeable blend of two styles that were en vogue during the early Talkie era: the sophisticated comedy-drama and the gangster picture, apart from also being adapted from a stage play (as were a good many movies back then).

The lead proper of the film is George Raft, who had just shot to stardom following his memorable supporting role in Howard Hawks’ SCARFACE (1932); of the stars associated with the heyday of the Gangster movie, Raft always seemed to me the most limited in range – but he does well enough here, flanked by his butler-cum-henchman Roscoe Karns (a mainstay of 1930s comedies). Watching this flick 75 years after it was made, I couldn’t help but wonder about all the gay subtexts today’s audiences would erroneously interpret in their “relationship” here!

Raft is the owner of a speakeasy who wants to improve himself for the sake of ‘mysterious’ socialite Constance Cummings (who, as it turns out, used to own the building) – despite being involved with at least two other women of lower standards (Wynne Gibson and Mae West); to do so, he engages the services of elderly teacher Alison Skipworth. Cummings (who’s adorable throughout – as had also been that same year in Harold Lloyd’s MOVIE CRAZY) incurs the wrath of jealous Gibson, who confronts her and Raft with a gun – a situation which Cummings finds exciting, drawing her nearer to Raft than she intended and deluding him into thinking that she has affections for him; of course, when he finds out that she had counted on marrying wealthy Louis Calhern all along, he gives up his cultured airs and withdraws his promise of selling the club to a rival! But during the ensuing mob fracas at Raft’s joint, Cummings realizes that she loves him after all...

As I said, I found the film to be fairly interesting for several reasons: Mae West’s own role isn’t central to the main plot (in fact, she not only appears exactly at the midway point of the film but shares more scenes – and even a bed! – with Skipworth than she does with Raft himself), but her presence certainly boosts proceedings; already, she’s got her way with dialogue (and not just the famous “Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie” line) but it also feels like she’s playing a real character in this case rather than just being her in-your-face ‘naughty’ self…and West’s figure is perhaps at its sexiest here with as racy a costume as Pre-Code Hollywood liberalism ever got!

It’s amusing to watch the accompanying trailer today – hyping Raft’s rising star power (even mentioning a couple of earlier films apart from SCARFACE, both of which are now completely forgotten), and how this was achieved largely through the clamor of the movie-going public, when NIGHT AFTER NIGHT’s greatest (single?) claim to fame nowadays is for having introduced Mae West to the silver screen!

Finally, I wonder whether Universal is planning to release a second set of her films (they own four of her remaining titles); THE HEAT’S ON (1943) is a Columbia picture but it has already been released by Universal on R2 as part of a 6-Disc Mae West Set which also includes the bulk of the as-yet-unavailable titles on R1 (plus a couple of overlaps)!

Night After Night finds George Raft as a former boxer now owner of a swank speakeasy who is looking to move up in class. A part Raft could really identify with considering his own humble circumstances.

In addition Raft is juggling three women, society girl Constance Cummings, former flapper Wynne Gibson, and the one and only Mae West.

Without Mae in this film, Night After Night would be just a routine film with nothing terribly special. But because Mae made her screen debut, the film has come down as a legend.

West is only on the screen for about 15 minutes of the film, but it's 15 unforgettable minutes. Raft is trying to acquire some culture and polish and hires Alison Skipworth to educate him in the finer arts. He brings her along to dinner with Constance Cummings to impress Cummings and Mae crashes the party.

When Paramount hired West they apparently did not know what to do with her. The part she has here as originally written is a supporting role. Remember she was a star on Broadway and wrote a lot of her own material. Mae persuaded the powers of Paramount to let her write her own lines and she wound up stealing the film.

As this was pre-Code the budding relationship of Mae to Skipworth shows more than a hint of lesbianism. As it was Mae West was quite the gay community icon, still is.

Without her, Night After Night is a routine, even substandard melodrama, with Mae it's a classic.

I was expecting a lousy film whose only value was as the debut film of Mae West - I mean Leonard calls it a "crashing bore"! But what I got was a delightful film, excellently acted by all, with a profound theme and great dialogue. It is a film about dissatisfaction - all the characters are unhappy with their lot and desperately grasping for change. George Raft, the slick gangster, wants an education and true love. Constance Cummings also wants true love, although she thinks she wants security. And Alison Skipworth wants the wild life instead of school teacher drudgery. Only Mae West seems happy with her place as a man-devouring cosmetician.

This film is not a comedy - although it has many hilarious scenes (wait until you see West and Skipworth in bed together!). It is a frank and insightful drama, very risque and dangerously sexual. George Raft is unusually sensitive, Constance Cummings outstanding and Alison Skipworth dazzling. The supporting cast is also fine - led by the incomparable Mae West. A rare treat from the early 1930's.

"Night After Night" was an otherwise unmemorable George Raft opus of the early 1930's... The scene was the entrance to a nightspot...

Enter Mae West, magnificently dripping in so much jewelery it must have given the lighting cameraman several heart attacks in his attempts to "damp it down" so that it didn't "flash up the bottle" as she moved…

Cries the hat-check girl: "Goodness, what beautiful diamonds!"

Mae West: "Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie."

Gangsters' molls... they are part of the legend of the mobster movie… And in "Night After Night" it was never openly established just what kind of a dame Mae West was playing, but with all those rocks she looked like the gangster's moll to top them all