Sunday, July 15, 8:45 p. m., The Castro, San Francisco
The human condition is a story best told in the unforgiving harshness of black and white. The global struggle of good versus evil, in its most tawdry and salacious terms, are found at the heart of an outrageous over-the-top existence, but only in the hands of Cecil B. deMille. Enter the average day at an All-American high school in deMille's final silent feature The Godless Girl, and discover Grace (Mary Jane Irving) covertly stuffing fliers announcing a secret meeting of The Godless Society into hallway lockers. Before long the staff and student body are whipped into an indignant frenzy of shock and disapproval as the principal declares membership in the immoral club and mere ownership of this piece of paper to be grounds for expulsion and criminal prosecution. Lines are drawn without a hint of middle ground. The bad girl Judy Craig (Lina Basquette), daughter of an atheist, sits at her classroom desk next to good boy and god-fearing Christian Bob Hathaway (George Duryea). They exchange philosophical barbs and an obvious mutual attraction. As is usually the case, the kids seem to know everyone's business while the adults are in total darkness. When their teacher gets his hands on a the flier in question the guilty party is ordered to step forward. Bob requests that the students be allowed to handle the matter. His request is granted (only in Hollywood) and an enormous battle ensues when the Christian kids attempt to break up the secret meeting that night. As the battle rages on the five story stairwell of the abandoned building a railing gives way (on the top floor of course), and Grace plummets to her death. As the mob of kids scatter and the police descend, Judy and Bob remain behind, lamenting their efforts for causing the tragedy. Classroom melodrama graduates into the three-ring spectacle of a co-ed teenage prison film when the kids are committed to the State Reformatory, an enormous brick and barb-wire edifice with a sub-human head guard named The Brute (Noah Beery). Replete with hard labor and excessive humiliation, life at the workhouse is shown in infinite detail, with the boys and girls separated by only a high-tension electrified chain-link fence. Bob watches Judy suffer and swears "I'll get you out of here!" The sadistic Brute sees them clasping hands through the fence and turns on the power, leaving atheist Judy with crosses burned into her palms. Bob is thrown in solitary confinement when he defies the Brute, while Judy works in the Women's Meat House, prancing around with a string of sausages as though they were pearls. They escape and find their way to an abandoned farm before the bloodhounds track them down. Returned to solitary confinement, Bob and Judy are chained to their bunks when a fire ignites and spreads inside the girl's wing in the spectacular finale of The Godless Girl. Bob is freed and goes back to save Judy, with only the Brute blocking his way. A master of film-making within the studio system, deMille relied on a host of craftsmen to manufacture this and other spectacles. Much of the credit for The Godless Girl should rightly go to his long-standing scenarist Jeanie Macpherson, whose unmistakable touch is visible throughout the film.
The human condition is a story best told in the unforgiving harshness of black and white. The global struggle of good versus evil, in its most tawdry and salacious terms, are found at the heart of an outrageous over-the-top existence, but only in the hands of Cecil B. deMille. Enter the average day at an All-American high school in deMille's final silent feature The Godless Girl, and discover Grace (Mary Jane Irving) covertly stuffing fliers announcing a secret meeting of The Godless Society into hallway lockers. Before long the staff and student body are whipped into an indignant frenzy of shock and disapproval as the principal declares membership in the immoral club and mere ownership of this piece of paper to be grounds for expulsion and criminal prosecution. Lines are drawn without a hint of middle ground. The bad girl Judy Craig (Lina Basquette), daughter of an atheist, sits at her classroom desk next to good boy and god-fearing Christian Bob Hathaway (George Duryea). They exchange philosophical barbs and an obvious mutual attraction. As is usually the case, the kids seem to know everyone's business while the adults are in total darkness. When their teacher gets his hands on a the flier in question the guilty party is ordered to step forward. Bob requests that the students be allowed to handle the matter. His request is granted (only in Hollywood) and an enormous battle ensues when the Christian kids attempt to break up the secret meeting that night. As the battle rages on the five story stairwell of the abandoned building a railing gives way (on the top floor of course), and Grace plummets to her death. As the mob of kids scatter and the police descend, Judy and Bob remain behind, lamenting their efforts for causing the tragedy. Classroom melodrama graduates into the three-ring spectacle of a co-ed teenage prison film when the kids are committed to the State Reformatory, an enormous brick and barb-wire edifice with a sub-human head guard named The Brute (Noah Beery). Replete with hard labor and excessive humiliation, life at the workhouse is shown in infinite detail, with the boys and girls separated by only a high-tension electrified chain-link fence. Bob watches Judy suffer and swears "I'll get you out of here!" The sadistic Brute sees them clasping hands through the fence and turns on the power, leaving atheist Judy with crosses burned into her palms. Bob is thrown in solitary confinement when he defies the Brute, while Judy works in the Women's Meat House, prancing around with a string of sausages as though they were pearls. They escape and find their way to an abandoned farm before the bloodhounds track them down. Returned to solitary confinement, Bob and Judy are chained to their bunks when a fire ignites and spreads inside the girl's wing in the spectacular finale of The Godless Girl. Bob is freed and goes back to save Judy, with only the Brute blocking his way. A master of film-making within the studio system, deMille relied on a host of craftsmen to manufacture this and other spectacles. Much of the credit for The Godless Girl should rightly go to his long-standing scenarist Jeanie Macpherson, whose unmistakable touch is visible throughout the film.