Oddball
Films and guest Curator Taylor Morales bring you, Sex, Censorship and Betty Boop: The
Ladies of Pre-Code Hollywood, a
collection of films exploring Hollywood’s fascination with female sexuality in
the years before 1934, when the industry adopted the Motion Picture Production
Code, a set
of moral censorship standards that governed the US motion pictures industry
between 1934 and 1968. The Code, which banned all forms of overt sexuality
and “immorality”, forced Betty Boop to lengthen her skirt and cover her garter.
This collection of films and cartoon shorts captures the good, the bad and the
offensive of this remarkable pre-code period. Looking back at the era with a
critical eye we see examples of sex as an avenue to power for females as well
as a means of exploitation. Our evening
will begin with a dance lesson from the queen of sex appeal, Ms. Betty Boop, in the Fleischer brothers' short The Dancing Fool (1932). In this
cartoon Betty Boop teaches her animal friends how to shake their stuff, and
shakes her building to pieces in the process. Our next film, the Janus Films
documentary, The Love Goddesses Pt. 1 (1965),
explores the rise of female sex symbols from the silent film era through the 1930s.
Greta Garbo, Mae West, Jean Harlow and other love goddesses grace the screen in
classic scenes that taught the world how to love. We then turn from glam to ham
with Red Noses (1932), a live-action
comedy short about two female office workers sent to the Turkish baths by their
boss when they are too sick to go to work. This thin plot is more of an excuse
to enact a series of comedy bits involving scantily clad women on treadmills
and mechanical horses. It does not disappoint. Next, we’ll move from the
hilarious to the egregious with Polly
Tix Goes to Washington (1934), a “baby burlesk” starring 3-year-old Shirley
Temple, in one of her first films, as Polly Tix, a high-class call girl sent to
Washington to seduce a congressman into voting on a Castor Oil bill. This film
displays the darker side of pre-code sexuality, landing on the wrong side of
the precarious line between satirical and sinister. We will come full circle
with our last film, another Betty Boop cartoon, Minnie the Moocher (1932), featuring the first known filmed footage
of jazz band leader Cab Calloway. When Betty runs away from home she finds
herself in the company of a cast of scary creatures. Will she make it back
home?
Date: Thursday, September 5th, 2013 at 8:00pm
Venue: Oddball Films, 275
Capp Street San Francisco
The Dancing Fool (B+W, 1932)
Bimbo
and Koko are sign painters hired to paint the lettering on the window of “Betty
Boop’s Dancing School". Inside Betty teaches her friends how to shake
their tail feathers to the tune of "Dancing to Save Your Soul." This
cartoon provides us with a glimpse of the kind of dancing and outfits that
would be banned from Betty’s cartoons only two years later.
The Love Goddesses (B+W, 1965)
This film, produced in 1965, examines
how, from the silent film era to the 1930s, societal attitudes about onscreen
portrayals of love and sex evolved on screen. The film provides a collage of
the progression of female starlets from engenues, to vamps, to the love
goddesses of the pre-code era. See Marlene Deitrich, Mae West, Jean Harlow,
Greta Garbo and others in scenes from their most famous and sumptuous performances.
Red Noses (B+W, 1932)
When Thelma Todd and Zazu Pitts go to a Turkish bath to
get rid of their colds they are subjected to undressing, strange mechanical
devices, an enormous treadmill, and one of the least relaxing massages ever
depicted on screen. Zazu wants to leave but can’t find her clothes so she
steals a men’s suit and walks through the women’s baths. Chaos ensues.
Polly Tix in Washington
(B+W, 1933)
Shirley
Temple later called this film "a cynical exploitation of our childish
innocence." In her autobiography Shirley Temple Black recalls the plot:
"I was a strumpet on the payroll of the Nipple Trust and Anti-Castor Oil
Lobby. Mine was the task of seducing a newly arrived bumpkin senator."
Shirley’s mother designed the black lace undergarments and bra her daughter
wears on screen. This “Baby Burlesk” casts a group of toddlers in adult roles. The
result is cringe-worthy, but gives an honest glimpse of the laissez faire
attitude to censorship in the pre-code era.
Minnie the Moocher (B+W, 1932)
Jazz musician Cab Calloway and his band provide the score to
this fascinating Betty Boop short and themselves appear in a live-action
introduction—Cab’s first known film appearance. In Minnie the Moocher Betty decides to run way from home when her
parents insist she eat her dinner despite the fact that she doesn’t want to.
However when Betty and buddy Bimbo the clown find themselves in a spooky forest
haunted by a cast of jazzy ghosts, they scurry home.
Curator’s Biography:
Taylor
Morales is a Wesleyan University graduate of Film Studies and African American
studies. In her free time she screen prints stencil sweatshirts of silent film
actresses.