During the final dogfight scene, I was suprised with some of the adult language...pretty tame by today's standards, but for a movie in 1930 I would think "son of a bitch", "goddamn it", and "for Christ's sake" was pretty strong stuff. Anyone know of any other pre-code movies with comparable language?
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Ha...I watched that scene several times with and with out subtitles, it's all in there. I think he does say "son of a boche" once, but there's another, clear, "son of a bitch", plus "god damn it" and "for Christ's sake." PG rated stuff now, but probably pretty strong in 1930.
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~~~~~I heard it so watched again with the subtitles, he said 'son of a boche'.~~~~~
Allegedly.
Marlon, Claudia and Dimby the cats 1989-2005, 2007 and 2010.
A lot of lewd behaviour too. Married women stepping out on their husbands, loose women seducing men in uniform, etc.
When I'm gone I would like something to be named after me. A psychiatric disorder, for example.
It's funny how pre-code movies strike modern viewers. It runs the gamut from "that wasn't very risque" to "why can't they make movies as pure as this anymore" to "that must have been shocking to the audiences back then." Clearly, early movies contained whatever the makers thought would sell. In the movie Corruption, 1933, the reporter obviously gave the finger to a baddie. I've heard a range of h--l and d-mn and a sprinkling of other terms in the movies I've seen, as well as scenes that ranged from the G rated to what might be called "very adult."
My impression is, if you went to a conservative church you didn't go to movies at all. If you went to a moderate or liberal church or no church you chose the movie type you thought would suit your interests, primarily by who were the stars. However, there were plenty of movies that were pretty hard core in violence, theme, language, and ending. They had their own fans.
Everyone claims that lip readers have found all sorts of wild things in silent movies. I have no proof of that.
So was the target audience for this shocked? I'd venture to say some of the target audience might have been WWI vets and they would not have been shocked. 1920s American society was largely rural and in the cities heavily influenced by immigrants who were not highly educated or of the upper classes. It wasn't Victorian doilies on piano legs so the ladies wouldn't swoon. (British movies of that era depicting the wealthy were, in comparison with US movies then, remarkably old-fashioned in values. US movies about the upper crust were positively flippant about easy divorce, and made jokes about infidelity.)
Considering that three men died in the making of this film, I'd say they had every reason to ad lib freely. :) I'm not big on profanity but the language certainly fit in with the total movie. Hughes was right. The alternatives of no words or things like "phooey"...just would not have worked. The fact that there were more cases of it than usual was due to the fact that the dogfight went on a long time, not that the words were any more vile or upsetting to the viewer than they were in other movies then.
I read how attendeding a movie back in the teens and 20's was considered sinful. Silly attitudes back then. I have heard about the classic aerials in this oldie but goodie. I am watching it now.
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