X27 is an American alternative rock band, formed in Chicago in 2000. They are known for their live shows and stripped-down noisy punk rock . X27 is Carmen X and Rikkeh Suhtn (formerly of Duotron ). They are currently based in Brooklyn , New York .
93-671: The name X27 comes from the film Dishonored , where Marlene Dietrich plays Agent X27 who hides code in her music; it is not related to the X27 bus route in Brooklyn, where they are based. X27 are influenced by punk , experimental , contemporary classical , Music of North Africa , grunge , and 60's pop. Rikkeh recently said, "I want to make music for people who think AC/DC and Led Zeppelin are great American rock bands." The musicians who have played in X27 include Oran Canfield (son of Jack Canfield of
186-453: A World War I veteran cast onto the streets with a morphine addiction from his hospital stay. In Wild Boys of the Road (1933), the young man played by Frankie Darrow leads a group of dispossessed juvenile drifters who frequently brawl with the police. Such gangs were common; around 250,000 youths traveled the country by hopping trains or hitchhiking in search of better economic circumstances in
279-486: A chorus girl , she regularly received diamonds and pearls as gifts, but now must content herself with a corned beef sandwich. In Union Depot (1932), Douglas Fairbanks Jr. puts a luscious meal as the first order of business on his itinerary after coming into money. Given the social circumstances, politically oriented social problem films ridiculed politicians and portrayed them as incompetent bumblers, scoundrels, and liars. In The Dark Horse (1932), Warren William
372-476: A "devil". Behind enemy lines and accompanied by her black cat, X-27 disguises herself as a dimwitted peasant girl and gains employment as a chambermaid in the Russian officers' quarters. She quickly seduces a Russian senior officer, Colonel Kovrin, with liquor and sex play, and obtains the top secret plans for the attack, which she copies in a code that looks like it is sheet music for a musical composition. Kranau, who
465-534: A Russian spy. They flirt for a bit before, sensing danger, he escapes. When X-27 reports her failure, the Chief orders her to disengage, saying that Kranau "is too clever to be trapped by a woman." Later that night, Kranau breaks into X-27's apartment while she is loudly playing the piano and discovers the orders for her next assignment: to fly over the Polish border, infiltrate the Russian military headquarters there, and acquire
558-579: A building named after himself that is larger than the Empire State Building . He tricks everyone he knows into poverty to appropriate others' wealth. He is ultimately shot by his secretary ( Verree Teasdale ), who then ends the film and her own life by walking off the roof of the skyscraper. Americans' mistrust and dislike of lawyers was a frequent topic of dissection in social problem films such Lawyer Man (1933), State's Attorney , and The Mouthpiece (1932). In films such as Paid (1930),
651-492: A cablegram to all the studios in March 1934 mandating that Dillinger not be portrayed in any motion picture. The genre entered a new level following the release of Little Caesar (1931), which featured Edward G. Robinson as gangster Rico Bandello. Caesar , along with The Public Enemy (starring James Cagney ) and Scarface (1932) (starring Paul Muni ), were, by standards of the time, incredibly violent films that created
744-665: A censorship board in 1921. Virginia followed suit the next year, and eight individual states had a board by the advent of sound film. Many of these boards were ineffectual. By the 1920s, the New York stage, a frequent source of subsequent screen material, had topless shows; performances were filled with profanity, mature subject matter, and sexually suggestive dialogue. Early during the sound system conversion process, it became apparent that what might be acceptable in New York would not be so in Kansas. In 1927, Hays suggested studio executives form
837-429: A committee to discuss film censorship. Irving Thalberg of Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM), Sol Wurtzel of Fox , and E. H. Allen of Paramount responded by collaborating on a list they called the " Don'ts and Be Carefuls ", based on items that were challenged by local censor boards, and which consisted of eleven subjects best avoided, and twenty-six to be handled very carefully. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) approved
930-608: A dispossessed juvenile delinquent is in court expecting a jail sentence. However the judge lets the boy go free, revealing to him the symbol of the New Deal behind his desk, and tells him "[t]hings are going to be better here now, not only here in New York, but all over the country." A box-office casualty of this hopefulness was Gabriel Over the White House , which entered production during the Hoover era malaise and sought to capitalize on it. By
1023-414: A futile protest from a youthful officer, she is shot. Sternberg based his "espionage melodrama" loosely on the exploits and demise of Dutch spy Mata Hari , with screenplay by Daniel Nathan Rubin. The title " Dishonored " was conferred upon the film by studio executives over Sternberg's objections. He said "the lady spy was not dishonored, but killed by firing squad", and felt the chosen title would distort
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#17328522911301116-496: A high and self-sufficing purpose. Hays and others, such as Samuel Goldwyn , obviously felt that motion pictures presented a form of escapism that served a palliative effect on American moviegoers. Goldwyn had coined the famous dictum, "If you want to send a message, call Western Union " in the pre-Code era. However, the MPPDA took the opposite stance when questioned about certain so-called "message" films before Congress in 1932, claiming
1209-448: A lot further than more recent efforts such as Wall Street , and it's amazing how much plot and character are gracefully shoehorned into 75 minutes." The film featured pre-Code megastar Warren William (later dubbed "the king of Pre-Code" ), "at his magnetic worst", playing a particularly vile and heartless department store manager who, for example, terminates the jobs of two long-standing male employees, one of whom takes his own life as
1302-628: A memory." Although the liberalization of sexuality in American film had increased during the 1920s, the pre-Code era is either dated generally to the start of the sound film era, or more specifically to March 1930, when the Hays Code was first written. Over the protests of NAMPI, New York became the first state to take advantage of the Supreme Court's 1915 decision in Mutual Film vs. Ohio by instituting
1395-400: A monk that visits her while she is awaiting execution: that she be furnished with a piano in her cell, and that she be permitted to wear the clothing in which she "served, not my country, but my countrymen" (that is, what she wore as a streetwalker). Both requests are granted. Standing before the firing squad, Marie declines a blindfold and coolly applies lipstick. After a short delay caused by
1488-434: A party given in tribute to his career in photography by Moët & Chandon . Their 2005 album antilove was record by Steve Albini best known for his recording of Nirvana 's In Utero and The Pixies ' Surfer Rosa . Dishonored (film) Dishonored is a 1931 American pre-Code romantic spy film directed and edited by Josef von Sternberg , who also co-wrote the film with Daniel N. Rubin . It
1581-536: A picture, to be titled Mad Dog of Europe , which was intended to be a full-scale attack on Hitler. Jaffe had quit his job at RKO Pictures to make the film. Hays summoned the pair to his office and told them to cease production as they were causing needless headaches for the studios. Germany had threatened to seize all the properties of the Hollywood producers in Germany and ban the import of any future American films. In
1674-448: A potential government takeover of film censorship and social research seeming to indicate that movies that were seen to be immoral could promote bad behavior, was enough pressure to force the studios to capitulate to greater oversight. In 1922, after some risqué films and a series of off-screen scandals involving Hollywood stars, the studios enlisted Presbyterian elder Will H. Hays to rehabilitate Hollywood's image. Hays, later nicknamed
1767-549: A product of the excesses of the previous decade. In looking back upon the 1920s, events were increasingly seen as occurring in prelude to the market crash. In Dance, Fools, Dance (1931), lurid party scenes featuring 1920s flappers are played to excess. Joan Crawford ultimately reforms her ways and is saved; less fortunate is William Bakewell , who continues on the careless path that leads to his ultimate self-destruction. For Rain or Shine (1930), Milton Ager and Jack Yellen composed " Happy Days Are Here Again ". The song
1860-481: A prostitute is removed by the authorities from a tenement building in the red-light district – a case of suicide. When Marie Kolverer, a fellow streetwalker, offers a word of sympathy, the concierge warns that she is destined to suffer the same fate. She responds: "No I am not. I am not afraid of life... Although I am not afraid of death, either." The Chief of Austrian Secret Service overhears Marie's remark. He approaches her, and she invites him up to her flat, assuming
1953-471: A result. He also threatens to fire Loretta Young 's character, who pretends to be single to stay employed, unless she sleeps with him, then attempts to ruin her husband after learning she is married. Films that stated a position about a social issue were usually labeled either "propaganda films" or "preachment yarns". In contrast to Goldwyn and MGM's definitively Republican stance on social issue films, Warner Brothers, led by New Deal advocate Jack L. Warner ,
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#17328522911302046-463: A security leak, and he has been on the lookout for an attractive female to serve as a secret agent to help expose the man he thinks is the traitor: Colonel von Hindau, who is attached to the chief of staff of the Austrian army. The Chief says he thinks Marie may be right for the job. She accepts the offer, remarking that, rather than the generous compensation the Chief promises, what primarily appeals to her
2139-415: A way that might arouse passion or be made to seem right and permissible. All criminal action had to be punished, and neither the crime nor the criminal could elicit sympathy from the audience. Authority figures had to be treated respectfully, and the clergy could not be portrayed as comic characters or villains. Under some circumstances, politicians, police officers and judges could be villains, as long as it
2232-535: Is Dietrich who ultimately passes judgment on her judges by choosing to die as a woman without a cause in a picture without a moral." 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
2325-533: Is again enlisted, this time to get an imbecile, who is accidentally in the running for Governor, elected. The candidate wins the election despite his incessant, embarrassing mishaps. Washington Merry-Go-Round portrayed the state of a political system stuck in neutral. Columbia Pictures considered releasing the film with a scene of the public execution of a politician as the climax before deciding to cut it. Cecil B. DeMille released This Day and Age in 1933, and it stands in stark contrast to his other films of
2418-466: Is decidedly anti-capitalist; however, its preface claims otherwise: In many parts of the South today, there exists an endless dispute between rich land-owners, known as planters, and the poor cotton pickers, known as "peckerwoods". The planters supply the tenants with the simple requirements of everyday life and; in return, the tenants work the land year in and year out. A hundred volumes could be written on
2511-477: Is inhabited by the archangel Gabriel upon being knocked unconscious. The spirit's behavior is similar to that of Abraham Lincoln . The president solves the nation's unemployment crisis and executes an Al Capone -type criminal who has continually flouted the law. Dictators were not just glorified in fiction. Columbia's Mussolini Speaks (1933) was a 76-minute paean to the fascist leader, narrated by NBC radio commentator Lowell Thomas . After showing some of
2604-453: Is stationed at the quarters, observes X-27's black cat stalking the hallway, alerting him to her presence. After a brief chase, he captures her and discovers the sheet music. When he performs the atonal piece on the piano, he realizes it is a code and promptly burns the score, confident he has thwarted X-27's mission. Kranau informs X-27 that she will be put to death the next morning, but discovers he has fallen in love with her. After they spend
2697-515: Is the opportunity to serve "the cause of Austria." Marie is enlisted in the Secret Service as Agent X-27. Marie/X-27 attracts Hindau's attention at a masquerade ball and gets invited back to his private apartment. During her faux seduction, the Chief places a telephone call to Hindau, requiring that he briefly absent himself and leaving X-27 free to search his personal belongings. When his butler mentions that Hindau does not smoke, she remembers that
2790-401: Is to ENTERTAIN. ... This we must keep before us at all times and we must realize constantly the fatality of ever permitting our concern with social values to lead us into the realm of propaganda ... the American motion picture ... owes no civic obligation greater than the honest presentment of clean entertainment and maintains that in supplying effective entertainment, free of propaganda, we serve
2883-578: The Chicken Soup for the Soul franchise, drummer for: Child Abuse (band) , Dig that body up it's alive , Caroliner and author of Long Past Stopping ), Sean Greathead (artist for: Garbage Pail Kids and Wacky Pack, member of: Nights ), Massey, Terry Klawth ( Mary Prankster , Jodie Foster's Army , Mighty Sphincter ), among others. X27 has played shows with The Fall (band) , The Kills , Gossip , Métal Urbain , Xiu Xiu , Erase Errata , Roger Sisters, Tracy +
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2976-564: The Great Depression of the 1930s motivated studios to produce films with racy and violent content, which boosted ticket sales. Soon, the flouting of the code became an open secret. In 1931, The Hollywood Reporter mocked the code, and Variety followed suit in 1933. In the same year as the Variety article, a noted screenwriter stated that "the Hays moral code is not even a joke any more; it's just
3069-602: 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
3162-672: The Victorian era was sometimes ridiculed as being naïve and backward. When the Code was announced, The Nation , a liberal periodical, attacked it. The publication stated that if crime were never presented in a sympathetic light, then, taken literally, "law" and "justice" would become the same. Therefore, events such as the Boston Tea Party could not be portrayed. And if clergy were always to be presented positively, then hypocrisy could not be examined either. The Outlook agreed. Additionally,
3255-475: The "Match King", who attempts to corner the global market on matches. William's vile character, Paul Kroll, commits robbery, fraud, and murder on his way from a janitor to a captain of industry. When the market collapses in the 1929 crash, Kroll is ruined and chooses suicide over imprisonment. William played another unscrupulous businessman in Skyscraper Souls (1932): David Dwight, a wealthy banker who owns
3348-515: The "screen Landis". In 1924, Hays introduced a set of recommendations dubbed "The Formula", which the studios were advised to heed, and asked filmmakers to describe to his office the plots of films they were planning. The Supreme Court had already decided unanimously in 1915 in Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio that free speech did not extend to motion pictures, and while there had been token attempts to clean up
3441-519: The 1920s. "After two years the Jazz Age seems as far away as the days before the war", F. Scott Fitzgerald commented in 1931. In the sense noted by Fitzgerald, understanding the moral climate of the early 1930s is complex. Although films experienced an unprecedented level of freedom and dared to portray things that would be kept hidden for several decades, many in America looked upon the stock market crash as
3534-980: The Hays Code, which was often ignored by Hollywood filmmakers. 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 or Red-Headed Woman , among many others, which featured independent, sexually liberated women. Many of Hollywood's biggest stars, such as Clark Gable , Bette Davis , James Cagney , Barbara Stanwyck , Joan Blondell , and Edward G. Robinson , got their start in
3627-674: The Mission Creek festival and the opening party for the Chicago Underground Film Festival which was also the premier of the MC5 documentary. X27 toured Europe, hitting France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. X27 also hit the UK, playing an Artrocker Show, Unpeeled Party and Club Motherfucker. In October 2006 they performed live in London for the fashion world at Nick Knight 's Bal Masque,
3720-621: The October 29, 1929, market crash) highlighted Bow's sexual attractiveness. 1920s stars such as Bow, Gloria Swanson , and Norma Talmadge freely displayed their sexuality in a straightforward fashion. The Great Depression presented a unique time for film-making in the United States. The economic disaster brought on by the stock market crash of 1929 changed American values and beliefs in various ways. Themes of American exceptionalism and traditional concepts of personal achievement, self-reliance, and
3813-1032: The Plastics , Guitar Wolf , Deerhoof , 400 Blows , Les Georges Leningrad , Foetus , Grizzly Bear (band) , Easy Action, Ex Models , and Bobby Conn to name a few. X27 have toured with Coachwhips , Hawnay Troof , Numbers (band) , The Flying Luttenbachers , The King Cobra ( Rachel Carns ) and Pink and Brown . They have played clubs such as the Knitting Factory NY, Bowery Ballroom , North Six (currently known as Music Hall of Williamsburg ) in Brooklyn , Beachland Ballroom in Cleveland , Empty Bottle in Chicago , and Magicstick in Detroit . X27 has played SXSW and CMJ music festivals. They have done live radio shows at Chicago's WNUR and WHPK and New York's WFMU . X27 played
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3906-483: The Pre-Code era was more incendiary than the gangster film; neither preachment yarns nor vice films so outraged the moral guardians or unnerved the city fathers as the high caliber scenarios that made screen heroes out of stone killers. In the early 1930s, several real-life criminals became celebrities. Two in particular captured the American imagination: Al Capone and John Dillinger . Gangsters like Capone had transformed
3999-458: The audience as to how to commit crime. Sadistic violence and reaction shots showing the faces of individuals on the receiving end of violence were considered especially sensitive areas. The Code later recommended against scenes showing robbery, theft, safe-cracking, arson, "the use of firearms", "dynamiting of trains, machines, and buildings" and "brutal killings", on the basis that they would be rejected by local censors. No motion picture genre of
4092-593: The audience feels sure that evil is wrong and good is right." The Code contained an addendum, commonly referred to as the Advertising Code, that regulated film advertising copy and imagery. On February 19, 1930, Variety published the entire contents of the Code. Soon the men obligated to enforce the code – Jason Joy, who was the head of the Committee until 1932, and his successor, Dr. James Wingate – would be seen as generally ineffective. The first film
4185-425: The audiences' desire for realism led to certain unsavory social, legal, and political issues being portrayed in film. The length of pre-Code films was usually comparatively short, but that running time often required tighter material and did not affect the impact of message films. Employees' Entrance (1933) received the following 1985 review from Jonathan Rosenbaum : "As an attack on ruthless capitalism, it goes
4278-399: The authority to order studios to remove material from a film in 1930, but instead worked by reasoning and sometimes pleading with them. Complicating matters, the appeals process ultimately put the responsibility for making the final decision in the hands of the studios themselves. One factor in ignoring the Code was the fact that some found such censorship prudish. This was a period in which
4371-529: The ban on homosexuality or the use of specific curse words, were never directly mentioned but were assumed to be understood without clear demarcation. Miscegenation, the mixing of the races, was forbidden. The Code stated that the notion of an "adults-only policy" would be a dubious, ineffective strategy that would be difficult to enforce. However, it did allow that "maturer minds may easily understand and accept without harm subject matter in plots which does younger people positive harm." If children were supervised and
4464-460: The breaking point. These economic circumstances led to a loss of nearly half of the weekly attendance numbers and closure of almost a third of the country's theaters in the first few years of the depression. Even so, 60 million Americans went to the cinema weekly. Apart from the economic realities of the conversion to sound, were the artistic considerations. Early sound films were often noted for being too verbose. In 1930, Carl Laemmle criticized
4557-439: The connection between mobsters and Broadway productions in movies such as Lights of New York (1928), Tenderloin (1928), and Broadway (1929). The Hays Office had never officially recommended banning violence in any form in the 1920s—unlike profanity, the drug trade or prostitution—but advised that it be handled carefully. New York's censor board was more thorough than that of any other state, missing only around 50 of
4650-502: The country's 1,000 to 1,300 annual releases. From 1927 to 1928, violent scenes removed included those in which a gun was pointed at the camera or "at or into the body of another character". Also subject to potential censorship were scenes involving machine guns, criminals shooting at law enforcement officers, stabbing or knife brandishing (audiences considered stabbings more disturbing than shootings), whippings, choking, torture and electrocution, as well as scenes perceived as instructive to
4743-402: The demanding director, prevented Sternberg from casting Cooper opposite Dietrich. His substitute, actor Victor McLaglen, was not as popular a co-star for Dietrich. Sternberg's disdain for the strutting, medal-bedecked militarists and addiction to political intrigue is contrasted with the purity of a woman's feminine code of honor and "her love which transcends the trivial issue of politics." In
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#17328522911304836-410: The early 1900s, the United States was still primarily a rural country, especially in self-identity. D. W. Griffith 's The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912) is one of the earliest American films to feature urban organized crime. Prohibition 's arrival in 1920 created an environment in which those who wished to consume alcohol often had to consort with criminals, especially in urban areas. Nonetheless,
4929-483: The early 1930s. Complicating matters for the studios, the advent of sound film in 1927 required an immense expenditure in sound stages, recording booths, cameras, and movie-theater sound systems, not to mention the new-found artistic complications of producing in a radically altered medium. The studios were in a difficult financial position even before the market crash as the sound conversion process and some risky purchases of theater chains had pushed their finances near
5022-562: The economic realities of a country struggling to find its next meal. In Blonde Venus (1932), Marlene Dietrich 's character resorts to prostitution to feed her child, and Claudette Colbert 's character in It Happened One Night (1934) gets her comeuppance for throwing a tray of food onto the floor by later finding herself without food or financial resources. Joan Blondell 's character in Big City Blues (1932) reflects that, as
5115-495: The elderly man is engaging her for sex. The Chief discovers Marie is a war widow, as well as an accomplished pianist, and is very attached to her pet black cat. He poses as a foreign agent to test her loyalty and, to his satisfaction, she quietly alerts a constable. The gentleman establishes his credentials and invites Marie to see him at central intelligence headquarters. In the Chief's office, he explains to Marie that Austrian military forces have been suffering terrible losses due to
5208-450: 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 be largely forgotten by the general public within a generation. 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, along with
5301-399: The events implied elliptically, the code allowed what Brandeis University cultural historian Thomas Doherty called "the possibility of a cinematically inspired thought crime ". The Code sought not only to determine what could be portrayed on screen, but also to promote traditional values. Sexual relations outside of marriage could not be portrayed as attractive and beautiful, presented in
5394-490: The film's message. The Jazz Age prelude was almost singularly used to cast shame on the boisterous behavior of the 1920s. Cabin in the Cotton (1932) is a Warner Bros. message film about the evils of capitalism. The film takes place in an unspecified southern state where workers are given barely enough to survive and taken advantage of by being charged exorbitant interest rates and high prices by unscrupulous landowners. The film
5487-477: The following exchange, the Court Officers pass judgment on the despised former spy X-27, "the only life-giving force in their midst": Court Officer : "Before the sentence, have you anything to say?" Frau Kolverer : "No, I have nothing to say." Court Officer : "As a matter of record, tell me why a woman charged with important work should permit or aid the escape of a dangerous enemy. Why she should dishonor
5580-439: The legal system turns innocent characters into criminals. The life of Joan Crawford 's character is ruined and her romantic interest is executed so that she may live free, although she is innocent of the crime for which the district attorney wants to convict her. Religious hypocrisy was addressed in such films as The Miracle Woman (1931), starring Barbara Stanwyck and directed by Frank Capra . Many pre-Code films dealt with
5673-570: The list, and Hays created the Studio Relations Committee (SRC) to oversee its implementation. However, there was still no way to enforce these tenets. The controversy surrounding film standards came to a head in 1929. Director Cecil B. DeMille was responsible for the increasing discussion of sex in cinema in the 1920s. Starting with Male and Female (1919), he made a series of films that examined sex and were highly successful. Films featuring Hollywood's original " It girl " Clara Bow such as The Saturday Night Kid (released four days before
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#17328522911305766-447: The man who Hindau dropped off on the way home from the ball had given Hindau a cigarette, which she finds and from which she removes a secret message. Hindau returns from his phone call and, discovering his cover is blown, offers his compliments to X-27, retrieves his service revolver, and kills himself. The secret message leads X-27 to a casino, where she finds the man who had given Hindau the cigarette, who turns out to be Colonel Kranau,
5859-542: The motion picture "Czar", was paid the then-lavish sum of $ 100,000 a year (equivalent to more than $ 1.7 million in 2022 dollars). Hays had previously served as U.S. Postmaster General under president Warren G. Harding and as the head of the Republican National Committee . At the time of his hiring, he was president of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA); he held
5952-577: The movies before, such as when the studios formed the National Association of the Motion Picture Industry (NAMPI) in 1916, little had come of the efforts. In 1929, Catholic layman Martin Quigley , editor of the prominent trade paper Motion Picture Herald , and Father Daniel A. Lord , a Jesuit priest, created a code of standards (of which Hays strongly approved) and submitted it to
6045-460: The night together, X-27 manages to drug Kranau and make her escape back to Austria. She had committed the coded musical notation to memory when Kranau played it, so she is able to reconstruct the plans. Armed with this information, the Austrians crush the Russian offensive. Thousands of Russian troops are captured, Kranau among them. When Austrian secret service agents, with X-27 in attendance, examine
6138-434: The office reviewed, The Blue Angel , which was passed by Joy without revision, was considered indecent by a California censor. Although there were several instances where Joy negotiated cuts from films, and there were indeed definite, albeit loose, constraints, a significant amount of lurid material made it to the screen. Joy had to review 500 films a year using a small staff and little power. The Hays office did not have
6231-485: The overcoming of odds lost great currency. Due to the constant empty economic reassurances from politicians in the early years of the Depression, the American public developed an increasingly jaded attitude. The cynicism, challenging of traditional beliefs, and political controversy of Hollywood films during this period mirrored the attitudes of many of their patrons. Also gone was the carefree and adventurous lifestyle of
6324-413: The perception of entire cities. Capone gave Chicago its "reputation as the locus classicus of American gangsterdom, a cityscape where bullet-proof roadsters with tommygun-toting hoodlums on running boards careened around State Street spraying fusillades of slugs into flower shop windows and mowing down the competition in blood-spattered garages". Capone appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1930. He
6417-476: The period. Filmed shortly after DeMille had completed a five-month tour of the Soviet Union , This Day and Age takes place in America and features several children torturing a gangster who got away with the murder of a popular local shopkeeper. The youngsters are seen lowering the gangster into a vat of rats when the police arrive, and their response is to encourage the youths to continue this. The film ends with
6510-485: The position for 25 years and "defended the industry from attacks, recited soothing nostrums , and negotiated treaties to cease hostilities". Hollywood mimicked the decision Major League Baseball had made in hiring judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis as League Commissioner the previous year to quell questions about the integrity of baseball in the wake of the 1919 World Series gambling scandal ; The New York Times called Hays
6603-503: The previous year, both of which starred Marlene Dietrich. Oscar-winners Lee Garmes (cinematography) and Hans Dreier (un-credited art direction) served on the film. M-G-M studios, alarmed by the competition that the Sternberg-Dietrich phenomena posed to star Greta Garbo , responded with the copycat Mata Hari the same year. Production schedules, as well as some reticence on the part of actor Gary Cooper to again work with
6696-434: The prisoners, Kranau is identified as Agent H-14 and taken into custody. X-27 pretends not to know him, but requests that she be allowed to interrogate him privately, ostensibly to extract valuable information before he is summarily executed. Loath to see her lover lose his life, she "accidentally" drops her gun, permitting him to escape. She is arrested, convicted of treason, and sentenced to death. Marie makes two requests of
6789-536: The progress Italy has made during Mussolini 's 10-year reign, Thomas opines, "This is a time when a dictator comes in handy!" The film was viewed by over 175,000 jubilant people during its first two weeks at the cavernous Palace Theater in Albany, New York . The election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) in 1932 quelled the public affection for dictators. As the country became increasingly enthraled with FDR, who
6882-527: The rights and wrongs of both parties, but it is not the object of the producers of Cabin in the Cotton to take sides. We are only concerned with the effort to picture these conditions. In the end, however, the planters admit their wrongdoing and agree to a more equitable distribution of capital. The avaricious businessman remained a recurring character in pre-Code cinema. In The Match King (1932), Warren William played an industrialist based on real-life Swedish entrepreneur Ivar Kreuger , himself nicknamed
6975-433: The service of your country. Can you give one reason you failed to take advantage of that privilege?" Frau Kolverer : "I suppose I'm not much good, that's all." Court Officer : "Will you please stand up? You have left us no choice in your case. The crime is treason and the penalty is death. You will be executed tomorrow morning at dawn. And may God have mercy on your soul." As film historian Andrew Sarris observes: "Yet it
7068-413: The service, violate duty, because of a casual affection for that man." Frau Kolverer : "Perhaps I loved [Russian spy Colonel Kranau]." Court Officer : "You can't make me believe you can love a man you've known for a few hours. That sort of love can be bought on the streets." Chief of Secret Service : "I found her on the streets." Court Officer : "You had a chance to redeem your unfortunate life in
7161-554: The significance of the heroine's death. If Dietrich lives for love in The Blue Angel , and sacrifices for love in Morocco , she dies for love in Dishonored . — Andrew Sarris - from The Films of Josef von Sternberg (1966) The movie was rushed into production by Paramount to capitalize on the critical and popular success of Sternberg's films The Blue Angel and Morocco
7254-631: The streets in protest became a prevalent sight during the Great Depression. The Bonus Army protests of World War I veterans on the capital in Washington, D.C., on which Hoover unleashed a brutal crackdown, prompted many of the Hollywood depictions. Although social issues were examined more directly in the pre-Code era, Hollywood still largely ignored the Great Depression, as many films sought to ameliorate patrons' anxieties rather than incite them. Hays remarked in 1932: The function of motion pictures
7347-565: The studios wanted to appease the German government. The ban on Jews and negative portrayals of Germany by Hitler's government even led to a significant reduction in work for Jews in Hollywood until after the end of World War II. As a result, only two social problem films released by independent film companies addressed the mania in Germany during the pre-Code era ( Are We Civilized? and Hitler's Reign of Terror ). In 1933, Herman J. Mankiewicz and producer Sam Jaffe announced they were working on
7440-498: The studios. Lord's concerns centered on the effects sound film had on children, whom he considered especially susceptible to the medium's allure. Several studio heads, including Irving Thalberg of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), met with Lord and Quigley in February 1930. After some revisions, they agreed to the stipulations of the Code. One of the main motivating factors in adopting the Code was to avoid direct government intervention. It
7533-450: The surface of American life in the Depression was the fear of the angry mob, portrayed in panicked hysteria in films such as Gabriel Over the White House (1933), The Mayor of Hell (1933), and American Madness (1932). Massive wide shots of angry hordes, comprising sometimes hundreds of men, rush into action in terrifyingly efficient uniformity. Groups of agitated men either standing in breadlines, loitering in hobo camps, or marching
7626-426: The time the film was released on March 31, 1933, FDR's election had produced a level of hopefulness in America that rendered the film's message obsolete. Adolf Hitler 's rise to power in Germany and his regime's anti-Semitic policies significantly affected American pre-Code filmmaking. Although Hitler had become unpopular in many parts of the United States, Germany was still a voluminous importer of American films and
7719-434: The timetable for an imminent military offensive. He then empties her pistol and disables the telephone before confronting her. They flirt a bit more before X-27 calls Kranau a clown, to which he responds that he is a soldier who sometimes crosses enemy lines and engages in subterfuge, whereas she uses her sexuality to "trick men into death". She attempts to delay him with a kiss, but he flees rather than risk falling in love with
7812-728: The urban-crime genre was mostly ignored until 1927 when Underworld , which is recognized as the first gangster movie, became a surprise hit. According to the Encyclopedia of Hollywood entry on Underworld , "The film established the fundamental elements of the gangster movie: a hoodlum hero; ominous, night-shrouded city streets; floozies; and a blazing finale in which the cops cut down the protagonist." Gangster films such as Thunderbolt (1929) and Doorway to Hell (1930) were released to capitalize on Underworld ' s popularity, with Thunderbolt being described as "a virtual remake" of Underworld . Other late-1920s crime films investigated
7905-557: The wall-to-wall banter of sound pictures, and director Ernst Lubitsch wondered what the camera was intended for if characters were going to narrate all the onscreen action. The film industry also withstood competition from the home radio, and often characters in films went to great lengths to belittle other media. The film industry was not above using the new medium to broadcast commercials for its projects however, and occasionally turned radio stars into short feature performers to take advantage of their built-in following. Seething beneath
7998-496: The youngsters taking the gangster to a local judge and forcing the magistrate to conduct a trial in which the outcome is never in doubt. The need for strong leaders who could take charge and steer America out of its crisis is seen in Gabriel Over the White House (1933), about a benevolent dictator who takes control of the United States. Walter Huston stars as a weak-willed, ineffectual president (likely modeled after Hoover) who
8091-463: Was clear that they were the exception to the rule. The entire document contained Catholic undertones and stated that art must be handled carefully because it could be "morally evil in its effects" and because its "deep moral significance" was unquestionable. The Catholic influence on the Code was initially kept secret, owing to the Anti-Catholic bias of the time. A recurring theme was "throughout,
8184-622: Was even offered seven-figure sums by two major Hollywood studios to appear in a film, but he declined. Dillinger became a national celebrity as a bank robber who eluded arrest and escaped confinement several times. He had become the most celebrated public outlaw since Jesse James . His father appeared in a popular series of newsreels giving police homespun advice on how to catch his son. Dillinger's popularity rose so quickly that Variety joked that "if Dillinger remains at large much longer and more such interviews are obtained, there may be some petitions circulated to make him our president." Hays wrote
8277-404: Was featured in countless newsreels , it exhibited less desire for alternative forms of government. Many Hollywood films reflected this new optimism. Heroes for Sale , despite being a tremendously bleak and at times anti-American film, ends on a positive note as the New Deal appears as a sign of optimism. When Wild Boys of the Road (1933), directed by William Wellman , reaches its conclusion,
8370-430: Was produced and distributed by Paramount Pictures . The film stars Marlene Dietrich , Victor McLaglen , Gustav von Seyffertitz , and Warner Oland , and follows a female spy (Dietrich) for Austria-Hungary during World War I . Costume design was provided by Travis Banton , in one of his several collaborations with Dietrich. The story opens in 1915 on the streets of Vienna , Austria, in war-torn Europe. The corpse of
8463-573: Was repeated sarcastically by characters in several films such as Under Eighteen (1931) and 20,000 Years in Sing Sing (1933). Less comical was the picture of the United States' future presented in Heroes for Sale that same year (1933), in which a hobo looks into a depressing night and proclaims, "It's the end of America". Heroes for Sale was directed by prolific pre-Code director William Wellman and featured silent film star Richard Barthelmess as
8556-423: Was the most prominent maker of these types of films and preferred they be called "Americanism stories". Pre-Code historian Thomas Doherty has written that two recurring elements marked the so-called preachment yarns. "The first is the exculpatory preface; the second is the Jazz Age prelude." The preface was essentially a softened version of a disclaimer that intended to calm any in the audience who disagreed with
8649-426: Was the responsibility of the Studio Relations Committee, headed by Colonel Jason S. Joy, to supervise film production and advise the studios when changes or cuts were required. The Code was divided into two parts. The first was a set of "general principles" that mostly concerned morality. The second was a set of "particular applications", an exacting list of items that could not be depicted. Some restrictions, such as
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