madfashionista

) stars Helen Twelvetrees at the zenith of her popularity as the queen of lachrymose tearjerkers. As an innocent bride she's cheated on, as a woman of the world she's cheated on, the man who has pursued her cheats on her.

The real fun is Joan Blondell and Lilyan Tashman as (implied) lesbian roommates. We first meet them cozy in bed together. Both are unapologetic gold-diggers, going from one man to the next, with the furs and jewelry to prove it! Joan Blondell is second banana to Lilyan Tashman, who's great fun, especially in a scene where she and Twelvetrees get smashed together in Millie's run down apartment on Christmas.

John Halliday, who pursues Millie for much for the picture, meets Millie's 16 year old daughter (Anita Louise) and takes her to his lodge in the mountains for perfidious reasons. Millie follows them, hears her daughter's screams and shoots Halliday.

The courtroom ending is all-stops-out melodrama that made me laugh. Her daughter busting into the courtroom screaming "MOTHER!".

Another directed by Howard Hawks, stars Jimmy Cagney as a daredevil race car driver, Ann Dvorak as an embarrassingly clingy girlfriend, Joan Blondell as her buddy, and a colorless Eric Linden as Cagney's younger brother, who's determined to beat his brother at racing. Plus the inevitable Frank McHugh (if you watch enough Warner Bros. Pre-Codes he truly does seem ubiquitous) as Spuds, Cagney's mechanic. The racing sequences are the reason to see this film. Hawks does a fantastic job of catching the thrill of racing, horrific accidents, racing through thick dust and in one case the drivers hurtling through a line of fire spreading across the tracks.

The less said about the plot the better. The posters show Cagney and Blondell but they aren't a couple in this film. Which is too bad. I wanted to shake Ann Dvorak and say "Have some self-respect, woman!"

Directed by Howard Hawks, this stars a scenery chewing Edward G. Robinson with a terrible Portuguese accent and a hook for a hand, Richard Arlen as his fishing partner, and Zita Johann as the woman who enters a loveless marriage with Robinson. The plot is one part Moby Dick (giant shark, Robinson gets his arm bitten off early in the proceedings) and one part "They Knew What They Wanted", a play in 1924 that was later produced in 1937. Johann and Arlen fall in love. Melodrama ensues.

The tuna fishing is the best part, although the scenes filmed on location in earlier scenes drowns out the dialogue.