Restraining Or Developing American Films, Reconsideration of the Code
The Motion Picture Production Code influenced American filmmaking considerably from the 1930s to the 60s. Most say the code limits freedom of film expression and thus has negative effects on the development of American films. The code indeed restrained the expression of film in some aspects such as sex and violence, but it also made filmmakers develop other ways of expression in films. In this respect, the code actually had positive effects on the development of Hollywood filmmaking.
During the pre-code era, numerous Cinderella stories, or in other words, gold-digger films, were produced in the United States. Ending with a poor girl marrying a rich man, these movies reflected the impure romance that was based on money, and rendered the value of materialism to the public. Most importantly, within these films, there were many plots about how the heroine took the wealthy heroes from their current girlfriends by seducing the men such as dressing in very provocative clothing or actively having sex with them. The fashion trends of the overtly provocative clothing that the heroines dressed in and the free representations of sex in these plots gave women the idea that they could do whatever they needed to pursue a man’s love, especially by using their bodies to their advantage.
In the film It, a pre-code film which was about a shop girl who fell in love with her boss, the girl wanted to marry her boss and tried her best to take him away from his girlfriend. This film was not a rigor pre-code gold digger film, but some plots in the film mirrored some characteristics of gold-digger movies. In the film, when the heroine Betty (Carry Bow) fell in love with her handsome employer, she tried her best to attract his attention. She agreed to have dinner with another man at Ritz, a luxurious restaurant where her employer Cyrus (Antonio Moreno) would go to that night. When she went upstairs to her apartment, she sewed her dress which she wore to work to a club dress that exposed her chest, her back, her arms and her legs. Thus the dress could perfectly show her sensuality, especially when compared with Cyrus’ current girlfriend Adela (Jacqueline Gadsden), who dressed in a silk gown that was elegant and conservative. The exposed dress Betty wore was in some degree a representation of the materialistic value of a woman’s sex as a good to be exchanged for a man’s affection.
In another gold-digger film, Red Headed Woman, Jean Harlow performed as a materialistic girl who pursued a life of luxury and had sex with several men to achieve her goal. In this film, the fashion we see completely expresses the idea of “sex for money” because the sex scenes in these films provide an image of a sexually promiscuous and self-indulgent woman. In the film, the change of Lil’s (Jean Harlow) dressing and her housing mirrors the change of her social standing in life, expressing her materialistic personality and active pursuit of money. When Lil first appears, she dresses poorly and lives in a small apartment shared with her friend. When she drops by Bill’s house and shouts at him about their secret relationship in front of his loving wife (Leila Hyams), she was dressed in a very loose wrap dress and with only one brooch tied, expressing her lack of self-respect. However, when she marries Bill (Chester Morris), her clothes change to an upper-class fashion with jewelry and gowns. Her housing changes to a grand and classical house located in a small town. And when she lives with Charles (Henry Stephenson), a main customer of Bill’s company from New York, she lives in a very modern and luxurious apartment in New York and was dresses in furs and diamonds, indicating that she has entered the highest circle of the United States through this triple jump.
Moreover, the numerous scenes in Red Headed Woman that expose Lil’s body are representation of her sensuality and her desire to have sex with upper-class men so that she can enter a higher class. One example is the scene when Lil first entered Bill’s house, she sat on the sofa and put her leg on Bill’s thighs. In this scene, her exposed calf reflects her desire to have sex with Bill because when Bill touched her leg, she looked very happy and pleased even though she knew Bill was married. Her reaction was to seduce Bill into having sex with her, consequently suggesting she wanted to break Bill’s marriage and entered his rich life. The scenes of Lil’s legs mirror the social values toward sexuality during pre-code America that it could be considered as goods, which renders negative information to girls that they did not need to work hard and independently and with respect to their bodies. The easiest way that they got to the upper class was to marry a wealthy man regardless of self-respect and social morality. Even worse, throughout the whole film, although Lil was described as a girl who was unashamed, the ending sequence seemed to give some level of approval to her aggressive pursuit of materialism and promiscuity, because at the ending sequence, she successfully caught another wealthy man in Paris. Without giving her any punishment, the film seemed to hold a positive attitude towards her value and her practice, which was very dangerous to social morality. On one hand, the impure romance expressed in gold-diggers’ films indicated that people married with each other not for love but for money such as “by means of her sex, rises to a position of prominence and luxury (Jacobs, 1991)”. In another hand, the free expression of sex within the films, which led to the gold-digger’s win over the conservative wives and girlfriends of the heroes with no guilt, made an impression to the public that the marriage and relationship was easy to break through sexuality, which took few serious attitudes towards the responsibility of marriage and love, making a very harmful effect on social morality.
As a result, the freedom given to the filmmakers in the representation of sex had a negative influence on the whole society and thus, in Great Depression era America, when people suffered from unemployment and impoverishment, the rebuilding of social mortality was more important than ever in American history. Hence a restriction of film representation was implemented, rendering more positive impressions of life to help American people get out of the darkness the Great Depression brought to them and gain confidence to strive for their future. Thus in this respect, the code made filmmakers think about how to render their ideas in a healthy and more acceptable way for audiences. The screwball romance film, a sub-genre of romantic comedy in post-code era, was an example to illustrate the importance of code during 30s and 40s American society. This female eccentric genre film was very popular in this era not only because it expressed more about the fun rather than sex of romance but also rendered many independent females’ images on the screens.
Because of the restriction of shooting sex scenes in films, filmmakers had to switch their concentration on the fun of romance and what people attained spiritually from the romance, which was well represented in two films, It Happened One Night and The Awful Truth. It Happened One Night told a story about a spoiled girl Ellen (Claudette Colbert) who left her wealthy home and met a cynical journalist (Clark Gable). They decided to travel together and finally fell in love with each other. In the film, the director Frank Capra tried to avoid sex scenes. For instance, when Ellen and Peter slept in the single room, there was an important setting in the room, the curtain, which was a symbol of a wall that separated the single room in two parts and thus kept distance between two unmarried people. Another example was about when Peter and Ellen slept over in a forest, Peter covered his coat on Ellen and at that moment, the two stared at each other face to face, within a close distance, but Peter stood up and left. Peter’s action here represents his respect and responsibility towards Ellen that before they built up a relationship, he could not make love with her. This suggests Capra’s idea of love based on responsibility and respect, which rendered a healthy and positive impression to audiences.
In The Awful Truth, the most interesting sequence was the last sequence that Lucy (Irene Dunne) and Jerry (Cary Grant) were sleeping in two bedrooms. They did not choose to live in the single room even though they used to be a couple and still loved each other, mirroring their respect towards each other. The director McCarey smartly displayed their psychological change by showing the two little toys in the clock keep out and in back and forth every time when Jerry went to Lucy’s room and talked with her. In the end, the scene was that the boy toy went into the girl toy’s door, instead of show Lucy and Jerry kissing and sleep. Thus the film ended with a couple reaching mutual understanding and regrouping, not about what would happen in the room that night after they rebuilt their relationship. This sequence was brilliant and funny but without the code this sequence might not have been created. Hence, in this regard, the code did not limit the creativity of filmmakers, but stimulated it.
Even though sometimes post-code filmmakers had to show some scenes related to sex such as exposed legs, in post-code era, they did not aim to show sex scene but to promote the development of plots. For example, in It Happened One Night, there was a sequence in which Ellen and Peter hitchhiked on the road. Peter boasted that he was an expert of hitchhiking but he could not even stop a car successfully while Ellen did it by exposing her calf. Different from Lil exposing legs in Red Headed Woman, Ellen did it because of the requirement of hitchhiking. This scene was very short and passed quickly that it was easy to tell that Capra did not mean to show Ellen’s sexuality but to make fun of the story: Peter seemed to be very professional but he failed, and Ellen never did it but she succeeded, which expressed the joke that Capra made about Peter’s confidence and boast. Another example was from The Awful Truth when Belle (Joyce Compton) sang on the stage and the wind blew her dress. She did not to mean to show her legs at all but McCarey deliberately designed this plot to make fun of this foolish girl and among the four times that her dress was blown, only two times audiences could see her legs and the scenes were quickly cut. More importantly, within the dialogue between Jerry and Lucy, Jerry said, “I just met her” and Lucy answered, “It’s easier to change her name than for a whole family to change theirs,” McCarey even showed his dislike towards the exposure of women’s body, considering it a shame, not a means of showing attractiveness.
Later films even started to ignore the sexual appeal of women to men. The film His Girl Friday had nothing to do with romance. Instead, the film was more about the cooperative relationship between a divorced couple, Walter (Carry Grant) and Hildy (Rosalind Russell). The heroine, Hildy, was shown to be a professional, confident and even masculine lady who put most of her concentration on her career. She was dressed in one set of suits all along, talked in a fast pace and a stable voice, worked and quarreled with several men, altogether showing her devoting and cult towards her career and professionalism. The expression of Hildy was a representation of professional and independent women who did not rely on men at all, which rendered a value that women could do whatever men did and women had the same talent and professionalism with men. Women also had capability to strive for their future and their lives. Most importantly, women worked hard not only because they had to raise themselves, but also because they liked and enjoyed their jobs.
Above all, within these three films, whether in It Happened One Night where the audiences followed the story of a spoiled and naughty girl who was born in a rich family and grew up to finally understand what was responsibility and love; or in The Awful Truth that people saw a beloved couple get rid of their misunderstanding and get together again; or in His Girl Friday that a lady achieved success in both her love and her career, the screwball romantic comedies in post-code era impressed 30s to 40s American audiences with their respects towards love and women, as well as giving American people who were struggling in the Depression a positive view of the future. These should all contribute to the code that it not only prevented the negative view developed but also inspired Hollywood filmmakers to reconsider how to express and represent the stories in a complete new way: thus they gradually learnt how to make profits in a positive and healthy way.
Preference:
Jacobs, L (1991). The wages of sin: Censorship and the fallen women film 1928-1942. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press
During the pre-code era, numerous Cinderella stories, or in other words, gold-digger films, were produced in the United States. Ending with a poor girl marrying a rich man, these movies reflected the impure romance that was based on money, and rendered the value of materialism to the public. Most importantly, within these films, there were many plots about how the heroine took the wealthy heroes from their current girlfriends by seducing the men such as dressing in very provocative clothing or actively having sex with them. The fashion trends of the overtly provocative clothing that the heroines dressed in and the free representations of sex in these plots gave women the idea that they could do whatever they needed to pursue a man’s love, especially by using their bodies to their advantage.
In the film It, a pre-code film which was about a shop girl who fell in love with her boss, the girl wanted to marry her boss and tried her best to take him away from his girlfriend. This film was not a rigor pre-code gold digger film, but some plots in the film mirrored some characteristics of gold-digger movies. In the film, when the heroine Betty (Carry Bow) fell in love with her handsome employer, she tried her best to attract his attention. She agreed to have dinner with another man at Ritz, a luxurious restaurant where her employer Cyrus (Antonio Moreno) would go to that night. When she went upstairs to her apartment, she sewed her dress which she wore to work to a club dress that exposed her chest, her back, her arms and her legs. Thus the dress could perfectly show her sensuality, especially when compared with Cyrus’ current girlfriend Adela (Jacqueline Gadsden), who dressed in a silk gown that was elegant and conservative. The exposed dress Betty wore was in some degree a representation of the materialistic value of a woman’s sex as a good to be exchanged for a man’s affection.
In another gold-digger film, Red Headed Woman, Jean Harlow performed as a materialistic girl who pursued a life of luxury and had sex with several men to achieve her goal. In this film, the fashion we see completely expresses the idea of “sex for money” because the sex scenes in these films provide an image of a sexually promiscuous and self-indulgent woman. In the film, the change of Lil’s (Jean Harlow) dressing and her housing mirrors the change of her social standing in life, expressing her materialistic personality and active pursuit of money. When Lil first appears, she dresses poorly and lives in a small apartment shared with her friend. When she drops by Bill’s house and shouts at him about their secret relationship in front of his loving wife (Leila Hyams), she was dressed in a very loose wrap dress and with only one brooch tied, expressing her lack of self-respect. However, when she marries Bill (Chester Morris), her clothes change to an upper-class fashion with jewelry and gowns. Her housing changes to a grand and classical house located in a small town. And when she lives with Charles (Henry Stephenson), a main customer of Bill’s company from New York, she lives in a very modern and luxurious apartment in New York and was dresses in furs and diamonds, indicating that she has entered the highest circle of the United States through this triple jump.
Moreover, the numerous scenes in Red Headed Woman that expose Lil’s body are representation of her sensuality and her desire to have sex with upper-class men so that she can enter a higher class. One example is the scene when Lil first entered Bill’s house, she sat on the sofa and put her leg on Bill’s thighs. In this scene, her exposed calf reflects her desire to have sex with Bill because when Bill touched her leg, she looked very happy and pleased even though she knew Bill was married. Her reaction was to seduce Bill into having sex with her, consequently suggesting she wanted to break Bill’s marriage and entered his rich life. The scenes of Lil’s legs mirror the social values toward sexuality during pre-code America that it could be considered as goods, which renders negative information to girls that they did not need to work hard and independently and with respect to their bodies. The easiest way that they got to the upper class was to marry a wealthy man regardless of self-respect and social morality. Even worse, throughout the whole film, although Lil was described as a girl who was unashamed, the ending sequence seemed to give some level of approval to her aggressive pursuit of materialism and promiscuity, because at the ending sequence, she successfully caught another wealthy man in Paris. Without giving her any punishment, the film seemed to hold a positive attitude towards her value and her practice, which was very dangerous to social morality. On one hand, the impure romance expressed in gold-diggers’ films indicated that people married with each other not for love but for money such as “by means of her sex, rises to a position of prominence and luxury (Jacobs, 1991)”. In another hand, the free expression of sex within the films, which led to the gold-digger’s win over the conservative wives and girlfriends of the heroes with no guilt, made an impression to the public that the marriage and relationship was easy to break through sexuality, which took few serious attitudes towards the responsibility of marriage and love, making a very harmful effect on social morality.
As a result, the freedom given to the filmmakers in the representation of sex had a negative influence on the whole society and thus, in Great Depression era America, when people suffered from unemployment and impoverishment, the rebuilding of social mortality was more important than ever in American history. Hence a restriction of film representation was implemented, rendering more positive impressions of life to help American people get out of the darkness the Great Depression brought to them and gain confidence to strive for their future. Thus in this respect, the code made filmmakers think about how to render their ideas in a healthy and more acceptable way for audiences. The screwball romance film, a sub-genre of romantic comedy in post-code era, was an example to illustrate the importance of code during 30s and 40s American society. This female eccentric genre film was very popular in this era not only because it expressed more about the fun rather than sex of romance but also rendered many independent females’ images on the screens.
Because of the restriction of shooting sex scenes in films, filmmakers had to switch their concentration on the fun of romance and what people attained spiritually from the romance, which was well represented in two films, It Happened One Night and The Awful Truth. It Happened One Night told a story about a spoiled girl Ellen (Claudette Colbert) who left her wealthy home and met a cynical journalist (Clark Gable). They decided to travel together and finally fell in love with each other. In the film, the director Frank Capra tried to avoid sex scenes. For instance, when Ellen and Peter slept in the single room, there was an important setting in the room, the curtain, which was a symbol of a wall that separated the single room in two parts and thus kept distance between two unmarried people. Another example was about when Peter and Ellen slept over in a forest, Peter covered his coat on Ellen and at that moment, the two stared at each other face to face, within a close distance, but Peter stood up and left. Peter’s action here represents his respect and responsibility towards Ellen that before they built up a relationship, he could not make love with her. This suggests Capra’s idea of love based on responsibility and respect, which rendered a healthy and positive impression to audiences.
In The Awful Truth, the most interesting sequence was the last sequence that Lucy (Irene Dunne) and Jerry (Cary Grant) were sleeping in two bedrooms. They did not choose to live in the single room even though they used to be a couple and still loved each other, mirroring their respect towards each other. The director McCarey smartly displayed their psychological change by showing the two little toys in the clock keep out and in back and forth every time when Jerry went to Lucy’s room and talked with her. In the end, the scene was that the boy toy went into the girl toy’s door, instead of show Lucy and Jerry kissing and sleep. Thus the film ended with a couple reaching mutual understanding and regrouping, not about what would happen in the room that night after they rebuilt their relationship. This sequence was brilliant and funny but without the code this sequence might not have been created. Hence, in this regard, the code did not limit the creativity of filmmakers, but stimulated it.
Even though sometimes post-code filmmakers had to show some scenes related to sex such as exposed legs, in post-code era, they did not aim to show sex scene but to promote the development of plots. For example, in It Happened One Night, there was a sequence in which Ellen and Peter hitchhiked on the road. Peter boasted that he was an expert of hitchhiking but he could not even stop a car successfully while Ellen did it by exposing her calf. Different from Lil exposing legs in Red Headed Woman, Ellen did it because of the requirement of hitchhiking. This scene was very short and passed quickly that it was easy to tell that Capra did not mean to show Ellen’s sexuality but to make fun of the story: Peter seemed to be very professional but he failed, and Ellen never did it but she succeeded, which expressed the joke that Capra made about Peter’s confidence and boast. Another example was from The Awful Truth when Belle (Joyce Compton) sang on the stage and the wind blew her dress. She did not to mean to show her legs at all but McCarey deliberately designed this plot to make fun of this foolish girl and among the four times that her dress was blown, only two times audiences could see her legs and the scenes were quickly cut. More importantly, within the dialogue between Jerry and Lucy, Jerry said, “I just met her” and Lucy answered, “It’s easier to change her name than for a whole family to change theirs,” McCarey even showed his dislike towards the exposure of women’s body, considering it a shame, not a means of showing attractiveness.
Later films even started to ignore the sexual appeal of women to men. The film His Girl Friday had nothing to do with romance. Instead, the film was more about the cooperative relationship between a divorced couple, Walter (Carry Grant) and Hildy (Rosalind Russell). The heroine, Hildy, was shown to be a professional, confident and even masculine lady who put most of her concentration on her career. She was dressed in one set of suits all along, talked in a fast pace and a stable voice, worked and quarreled with several men, altogether showing her devoting and cult towards her career and professionalism. The expression of Hildy was a representation of professional and independent women who did not rely on men at all, which rendered a value that women could do whatever men did and women had the same talent and professionalism with men. Women also had capability to strive for their future and their lives. Most importantly, women worked hard not only because they had to raise themselves, but also because they liked and enjoyed their jobs.
Above all, within these three films, whether in It Happened One Night where the audiences followed the story of a spoiled and naughty girl who was born in a rich family and grew up to finally understand what was responsibility and love; or in The Awful Truth that people saw a beloved couple get rid of their misunderstanding and get together again; or in His Girl Friday that a lady achieved success in both her love and her career, the screwball romantic comedies in post-code era impressed 30s to 40s American audiences with their respects towards love and women, as well as giving American people who were struggling in the Depression a positive view of the future. These should all contribute to the code that it not only prevented the negative view developed but also inspired Hollywood filmmakers to reconsider how to express and represent the stories in a complete new way: thus they gradually learnt how to make profits in a positive and healthy way.
Preference:
Jacobs, L (1991). The wages of sin: Censorship and the fallen women film 1928-1942. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press
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