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| I don't own this picture |
As most of you probably know, by Pre
-Code I am referring to the
Hays Production Code put into practice in the early 1920s that was meant to enforce
censorship in the movies. 'Meant' is the operant word. Trust me, whoever edited many early Hollywood films was not concerned about censors. Sex, alcohol, sex, crime, sex, murder and sex were the main subjects of the best of these films, many of which showcased the incredible ballsy talent of film's first screen-goddesses. Harlow was a little more, shall I say, earthy, than your Shearers or your Crawfords, but that's exactly what audiences loved about her. At age 23 she was the biggest box office draw during the Depression; diverting attention away from long bread lines with her low cut tops and no-holds-barred humor. "Red-Headed Woman" displays the best of the distinctly Harlow approach and has been regarded as a definitively feminist film throughout the years.
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| I don't own this pic. |
As the pretty Lil Andrews, Harlow plays her best known character in RHW: a girl born on the wrong side of the tracks who dreams (well schemes) of a better life. She uses her body
and persistent wiles to get men to do whatever she asks. Early in the film she
decides the best way to get out of her shared apartment and into a penthouse is to seduce her married boss, the venerable
Bill Legendre. Bill's conscious puts up a brave fight at first but eventually
goes down in the second round with Red's beauty and brazen desire winning out. But Lil isn't the kind of girl to be content
with only minor fortune. She finds
another man with even more money, seduces and gets engaged to him too! This
turns out to be her downfall as Bill finds out about the affair and uses
it to get her out of his life once and for all. This is one dame who won't go down without a fight though. Watch and see.
Harlow's an actress who's played good girls more often then bad in her career, but she knocked it out of the park when her characters were more devious. It's like that Mae West quote: "When I'm good, I'm very good, but when I'm bad, I'm better."You'd think we'd be unable to sympathize with her, but it's quite the opposite. Because it's Harlow we can watch her do things like show up drunk to her lover's apartment while he's home with his wife and end up rooting for her anyway. That's the tantalizing surprise of the film and really the beauty of Pre-code Hollywood in general: it's the dark side of people that we're interested in. Not the same-old chaste heroines, but the seedy ones who aren't afraid to show that they're seedy. Even today such women are not allowed to frolic around without meeting some terrible end or having some predictable change of heart. That's why its a shame
that the Hays Code did come to be enforced later in the same decade.
Misfits, Criminals, and Societal Outcasts lost their voice once
movies were cleaned up and made fit for "upholding the morality of
american society." Thank God we have these movies to
look back on so we can see what the movies were originally meant to do: show
different lifestyles so that we know its okay to be different.
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| I don't own this pic Una Merkel plays Harlows second banana best friend in the film |
Anita Loos, the screenwriter gives Lil a sharp tongue and a
propensity for prime comebacks. Loos is also the writer of the 1939 version of "The Women" which is a great film that is
very similar in plot and structure to "Red-Headed Woman." The major difference is
that it's entirely sympathetic to the wife, Norma Shearer, and quite
disparaging to the mistress, played in that film by Joan Crawford. I will say that though the emotional depth of "The Women" is
much more compelling, Red-Headed Woman, and all its myriad shocking moments, is
much more fun to watch. Harlow never needed a sparing partner; she knocked us all out all by herself.
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