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Pre-Code Hollywood

Pre-Code Hollywood was an era in the American film industry that occurred between the widespread adoption of sound in film in the late 1920s and the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code censorship guidelines (popularly known as the Hays Code) in 1934. Although the Hays Code was adopted in 1930, oversight was poor, and it did not become rigorously enforced until July 1, 1934, with the establishment of the Production Code Administration. Before that date, film content was restricted more by local laws, negotiations between the Studio Relations Committee (SRC) and the major studios, and popular opinion than by strict adherence to the Hays Code, which was often ignored by Hollywood filmmakers.

"Pre-Code" redirects here. For other uses, see Pre-code.

As a result, some films in the late 1920s and early 1930s depicted or implied sexual innuendo, romantic and sexual relationships between white and black people, mild profanity, illegal drug use, promiscuity, prostitution, infidelity, abortion, intense violence, and homosexuality. Nefarious characters were seen to profit from their deeds, in some cases without significant repercussions. For example, gangsters in films such as The Public Enemy, Little Caesar, and Scarface were seen by many as heroic rather than evil. Strong female characters were ubiquitous in such pre-Code films as Female, Baby Face, and Red-Headed Woman. Along with featuring stronger female characters, movies examined female subject matters that would not be revisited until decades later in US films.[1][2] Many of Hollywood's biggest stars, such as Clark Gable, Bette Davis, Barbara Stanwyck, Joan Blondell, and Edward G. Robinson, got their start in the era. Other stars who excelled during this period, however, like Ruth Chatterton (who decamped to England) and Warren William (the so-called "king of Pre-Code", who died in 1948), would wind up essentially forgotten by the general public within a generation.[3]


Beginning in late 1933 and escalating throughout the first half of 1934, American Catholics launched a campaign against what they deemed the immorality of American cinema. This, plus a potential government takeover of film censorship and social research seeming to indicate that movies which were seen to be immoral could promote bad behavior, was enough pressure to force the studios to capitulate to greater oversight.

Beginning of Code era (July 1, 1934)[edit]

Pre-code: "Don'ts" and "Be Carefuls", as proposed in 1927[edit]

The Code enumerated a number of key points known as the "Don'ts" and "Be Carefuls":[304]

Pre-Code films began to draw the ire of various religious groups, some Protestant but mostly a contingent of Roman Catholic crusaders.[305] Amleto Giovanni Cicognani, apostolic delegate to the Catholic Church in the United States, called upon Roman Catholics in the United States to unite against the surging immorality of films. As a result, in 1933, the Catholic Legion of Decency, headed by the Reverend John T. McNicholas (later renamed the National Legion of Decency), was established to control and enforce decency standards and boycott films they deemed offensive.[306][307] They created a rating system for films that started at "harmless" and ended at "condemned", with the latter denoting a film that was a sin to watch.[308]


The Legion spurred several million Roman Catholics across the U.S. to sign up for the boycott, allowing local religious leaders to determine which films to protest.[307][309] Conservative Protestants tended to support much of the crackdown, particularly in the South, where anything relating to the state of race relations or miscegenation could not be portrayed. Although the Central Conference of American Rabbis joined in the protest, it was an uneasy alliance given the heavy presence of Jewish studio executives and producers, which, it was felt, had inspired at least some of the vitriol from the Catholic groups.[310]


Hays opposed direct censorship, considering it "Un-American". He had stated that although there were some tasteless films in his estimation, working with filmmakers was better than direct oversight, and that, overall, films were not harmful to children. Hays blamed some of the more prurient films on the difficult economic times which exerted "tremendous commercial pressure" on the studios more than a flouting of the code.[311] Catholic groups became enraged with Hays and as early as July 1934 were demanding that he resign from his position, which he did not, although his influence waned and Breen took control, with Hays becoming a functionary.[312][313]


The Payne Study and Experiment Fund was created in 1927 by Frances Payne Bolton to support a study of the influence of fiction on children.[314] The Payne Fund Studies, a series of eight[315] books published from 1933 to 1935 which detailed five years of research aimed specifically at the cinema's effects on children, were also gaining publicity at this time, and became a great concern to Hays.[311][316][317] Hays had said certain films might alter "... that sacred thing, the mind of a child ... that clean, virgin thing, that unmarked state" and have "the same responsibility, the same care about the thing put on it that the best clergyman or the most inspired teacher would have."[318] Despite its initial reception, the main findings of the study were largely innocuous. It found that cinema's effect on individuals varied with age and social position, and that films reinforced audiences' existing beliefs.[319][320] The Motion Picture Research Council (MPRC, led by honorary vice president Sara Delano Roosevelt (mother of President Franklin D. Roosevelt),[321] and executive director the Rev. William H. Short[322]) which funded the study, was not pleased. An "alarmist summary" of the study's results written by Henry James Forman appeared in McCall's, a leading women's magazine of the time, and Forman's book, Our Movie Made Children, which became a bestseller, publicized the Payne Fund's results, emphasizing its more negative aspects.[310][323]


The social environment created by the publicity of the Payne Fund Studies and religious protests reached such a fever pitch that a member of the Hays Office described it as a "state of war".[324] However, newspapers including The Plain Dealer (Cleveland), New Orleans Times Picayune, Chicago Daily News, Atlanta Journal, Saint Paul Dispatch, the Philadelphia Record and Public Ledger, the Boston American and New York's Daily News, Daily Mirror, and Evening Post all lambasted the studies.[325] When discussing the Supreme Court's 1915 decision, film historian Gregory Black argues that the efforts of reformers might have been lessened had "filmmakers been willing to produce films for specialized audiences (adults only, family, no children) ... but the movers and shakers of the industry wanted or needed the largest possible market."[326] The most provocative films were the most profitable, with the 25% of the motion picture industry's output that was the most sensational supporting the cleaner 75%.[327]


By 1932, there was an increasing movement for government control.[328] By mid-1934 when Cardinal Dougherty of Philadelphia called for a Catholic boycott of all films, and Raymond Cannon was privately preparing a congressional bill supported by both Democrats and Republicans which would introduce Government oversight, the studios decided they had had enough.[329] They re-organized the enforcement procedures giving Hays and the recently appointed Joseph I. Breen, a devout Roman Catholic, head of the new Production Code Administration (PCA), greater control over censorship.[330] The studios agreed to disband their appeals committee and to impose a $25,000 fine for producing, distributing, or exhibiting any film without PCA approval.[5] Hays had originally hired Breen, who had worked in public relations, in 1930 to handle Production Code publicity, and the latter was popular among Catholics.[331] Joy began working solely for Fox Studios, and Wingate had been bypassed in favor of Breen in December 1933.[332][333] Hays became a functionary, while Breen handled the business of censoring films.[334]


Breen initially had anti-Semitic prejudices,[335] and was quoted as stating that Jews "are, probably, the scum of the earth."[309][336] When Breen died in 1965, the trade magazine Variety stated, "More than any single individual, he shaped the moral stature of the American motion picture."[337] Although the Legion's impact on the more effective enforcement of the Code is unquestionable, its influence on the general populace is harder to gauge. A study done by Hays after the Code was finally fully implemented found that audiences were doing the exact opposite of what the Legion had recommended. Each time the Legion protested a film it meant increased ticket sales; unsurprisingly, Hays kept these results to himself and they were not revealed until many years later.[338] In contrast to big cities, boycotts in smaller towns were more effective and theater owners complained of the harassment they received when they exhibited salacious films.[339]


Many actors and actresses, such as Edward G. Robinson, Barbara Stanwyck, and Clark Gable, continued their careers apace after the Code was enforced. However, others, such as Ruth Chatterton (who decamped to England around 1936) and Warren William (who died relatively young in the 1940s), who excelled during this period, are mostly forgotten today.[3][340]

After the Code[edit]

The Production code continued to be enforced, but during the lead up to World War II, the Hollywood studios began to worry that adhering to the Code would reduce their overseas profits from Europe.[359] At the same time, Hays warned about films being used for propaganda purposes.[360]


Hays stepped down in 1945, after 24 years as Hollywood's chief censor, but remained an advisor.[361] His successor, Eric Johnston, rebranded the association as the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).[359] In 1956, he oversaw the first major revision of the Production Code since it was created in 1930. This revision allowed the treatment of some subjects which had previously been forbidden, including abortion and the use of narcotics, so long as they were "within the limits of good taste". At the same time, the revisions added a number of new restrictions to the code, including outlawing the depiction of blasphemy and mercy killings in films.[362]


Johnston died in 1963,[363] and, after a three-year search, he was succeeded in 1966 by Jack Valenti, former aide to President Lyndon Johnson.[364] In November 1968, Valenti replaced the Production Code with a system of voluntary film ratings, in order to limit censorship of Hollywood films and provide parents with information about the appropriateness of films for children.[365] In addition to concerns about protecting children,[366] Valenti stated in his autobiography that he sought to ensure that American filmmakers could produce the films they wanted, without the censorship that existed under the Production Code that had been in effect since 1934.[365] The rating system went through some adjustments, but remains in effect.[367]

In the 1980s, New York City programmer Bruce Goldstein held the first film festivals featuring pre-Code films.[368] Goldstein is also credited by San Francisco film critic Mick LaSalle as the person to bring the term "pre-Code" into general use.[369]

Film Forum

ran several series of pre-Code films during the 2000s, showcasing films which had not been seen for decades and were not available on home video.[370]

UCLA

In 2014, the ran a 21-film season titled Hollywood Babylon: Early Talkies Before the Censors, at the BFI Southbank.[371][372]

British Film Institute

Pre-Code Double Feature (March 29, 2012) with and Registered Nurse

The Crash

Dorothy Mackaill Pre-Code Double Feature (March 29, 2012) with and The Reckless Hour.

Bright Lights

In the 1990s, MGM released several pre-Code films on laserdisc and VHS. "The Forbidden Hollywood Collection" included: Baby Face; Beauty and the Boss; Big Business Girl; Blessed Event; Blonde Crazy; Bombshell; Dance, Fools, Dance; Employees' Entrance; Ex-Lady; Female; Havana Widows; Heroes for Sale; Illicit; I've Got Your Number; Ladies They Talk About; Lady Killer; Madam Satan; Night Nurse; Our Dancing Daughters; Our Modern Maidens; The Purchase Price; Red-Headed Woman; Scarlet Dawn; Skyscraper Souls; The Strange Love of Molly Louvain; They Call It Sin; and Three on a Match.[373][374]


MGM/UA and Turner Classic Movies also released other pre-Code films such as The Divorcee, Doctor X, A Free Soul, Little Caesar, Mystery of the Wax Museum, Possessed, The Public Enemy, Red Dust (remade in 1953 as Mogambo), and Riptide under other labels.


In 1999, the Roan Group/Troma Entertainment released two pre-Code DVD collections: Pre-Code Hollywood: The Risqué Years #1, featuring Of Human Bondage, Millie and Kept Husbands, and Pre-Code Hollywood 2, featuring Bird of Paradise and The Lady Refuses.


Warner Bros. Home Video has released a number of their pre-Code films on DVD under the Forbidden Hollywood banner. To date, 10 volumes have been released:


Universal Home Video followed suit with the Pre-Code Hollywood Collection: Universal Backlot Series box set (April 7, 2009). It includes The Cheat, Merrily We Go to Hell, Hot Saturday, Torch Singer, Murder at the Vanities, and Search for Beauty, together with a copy of the entire Hays Code.


There have been numerous releases of manufactured-on-demand DVD-Rs, with Warner also issuing various pre-Coders individually and as dual-film sets via their Warner Archive Collection imprint. These include:


Turner has also released MOD DVD-Rs, including:

Circumventing censorship with alternate footage in pre-Code films

Classical Hollywood cinema

List of pre-Code films

Studio system

- Colloquial name for low-budget violent films

Video nasty

- Ended by similar concerns over lack of censorship

Golden Age of Comic Books

Doherty, Thomas Patrick. Hollywood's Censor: Joseph I. Breen and the Production Code Administration. New York: Columbia University Press 2009;  0-231-14358-3.

ISBN

Notes


Sources


Further reading