DVD/150: I'M NO ANGEL (Wesley Ruggles, 1933)

I'M NO ANGEL is my favourite Mae West film: it's sassy, funny, and Mae is at her most assured before the censorship battles began.

Tira dances in a carnival while her pickpocket lover 'Slick' steals from her audience, sharing the proceeds with the carny owner, Bill.  After Slick attacks one of Tira's fans, she asks Bill for help who suggests she becomes the lion tamer in his Manhattan circus - and she agrees!

Now the talk of the town, a wealthy playboy starts buying Tira gifts and a luxury apartment.  His cousin Jack, trying to save the playboy's engagement, visits Tira to end the relationship.  He is soon her new lover!

Jack proposes and Tira tells Bill she is quitting; Bill and Slick pursuade Jack that he and Tira are still together.  After Jack cancels the wedding, Tira sues him and defends herself against her male adversaries in the courtroom climax.

Shelf or charity shop?  Mae rules the roost in my plastic DVD storage box.  Wesley Ruggles deftly keeps the action moving and surrounds Mae with a fine company of actors including Edward Arnold as the conniving carny boss, Gertrude Michael as the snobbish fiancée who Mae reads to filth, Gertrude Howard as her maid Beulah - "Oh Beulah, peel me a grape" and, in one brief scene, Hattie McDaniel.  Repeating their onscreen partnership from SHE DONE HIM WRONG, Mae and Cary Grant work very well together but it's Mae's movie: with her sauntering walk and weaving stance, she is in practically every scene and you cannot watch anyone else. Her famous one-liners land effortlessly - when an admirer tells her he's a politician she replies "I don't like to work either" and is also an absolute feminist heroine: she wrote the script and dialogue and onscreen is nobody's fool - as she slinks off the carnival stage in her see-through gown and veil, she says "Am I making myself clear boys?" and as they whoop and holler, she says to herself "Suckers".

DVD/150: SHE DONE HIM WRONG (Lowell Sherman, 1933)

Mae West's 1928 Broadway hit DIAMOND LIL which she wrote and starred in led to a Paramount Pictures contract in 1931; after a scene-stealing appearance in George Raft's NIGHT AFTER NIGHT, Paramount wanted DIAMOND LIL to be her first starring role.

But the censors had banned the play from being filmed or any reference to Diamond Lil.  So Paramount had it re-written - not by West - and Diamond Lil became Lady Lou!

 

 

It is rare for a sex symbol to emerge in her first starring role - and at the age of 40 - but Mae did it.  The film was a box office smash, it's profit of $2 million saved Paramount from bankruptcy.

 

Mae chose Cary Grant to co-star; it was his 9th film but had already appeared opposite Tallulah Bankhead and Marlene Dietrich.

 

In the 1890s Bowery, singer Lady Lou is attracted to brilliant diamonds and dangerous men...

Shelf or charity shop?  SHE DONE HIM WRONG lives in the dvd limbo of a plastic storage box but it is a keeper due to Mae West's unstoppable screen presence. With her first starring film, Mae set her screen image and persona: usually set in the 1890s as the era's costumes suited her hourglass figure - and the long dresses could cover up the platform shoes she needed to give her height - she saunters through the action, hands on her hips and a leer on her lips, constantly in motion like she is maintaining balance standing in the middle of a seesaw, cynical but with a tender heart, rolling her eyes and drawling the best epigrams since Wilde.  Cary Grant works well as a Salvation Army officer with a secret, and there is eye-catching support from Gilbert Roland and Rafaela Ottiano as counterfeiters with a sideline in prostitution, while Louise Beavers sparkles as Lady Lou's maid Pearl.  Add into the mix Edith Head costumes, Mae singing "Frankie and Johnny", some great period atmosphere and a running time of 66 minutes, what's not to love?

"You know, it was a toss up whether I go in for diamonds or sing in the choir. The choir lost."