Pre-code set.

Michael O'Regan · Post by **Michael O'Regan** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 1:43 pm

How's this one?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pre-Code-Hollyw ... JHWAJNHVQ9

Post by **Danny Burk** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 2:10 pm

All are worth seeing; I think that MURDER AT THE VANITIES and SEARCH FOR BEAUTY are the best of the lot. However, I'd place all of them on a lower rung than the really top-notch precodes (mostly from WB) such as BABY FACE, RED-HEADED WOMAN, EMPLOYEES' ENTRANCE, etc.

ymmv · Post by **ymmv** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 2:22 pm

Buy the Forbidden Hollywood collection 3 first. Six movies, all of them directed by William Wellman, featuring Loretta Young, Mary Astor, James Cagney, George Brent, Barbara Stanwyck, Ruth Chatterton and Richard Barthelmes. It's a good collection if you like early talkies. Wild Boys of the Road is probably the best of the bunch.

Changsham · Post by **Changsham** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 5:28 pm

I got the complete Forbidden Hollywood sets 1 to 3 as a present from my wife recently. Seen about half the films so far. The quality and restorations are superb with some titles pristine. All top notch watchable Pre Code films. A must have collection. The Universal Pre Code set in on my to get list though.

mndean · Post by **mndean** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 5:28 pm

I like it, but I wouldn't buy it before the Warner sets. Universal could have put a couple of better precodes on there, like Laughter, Night World, or even Girls About Town (well, something with Lilyan Tashman, anyway). Danny did mention the two best of the set, and for me they were worth getting the set.

colbyco82 · Post by **colbyco82** » Wed Apr 27, 2011 5:28 pm

Its a great set, especially since the films in it rarely (if ever) show up on TCM.

Michael O'Regan · Post by **Michael O'Regan** » Thu Apr 28, 2011 12:22 am

Well, I'd already ordered it before I posted.

I'll get the Forbidden Hollywood series next.

Thanks folks

Brooksie · Post by **Brooksie** » Thu Apr 28, 2011 8:34 am

I think we discussed this one a little while ago. I'll say here what I said then - `Search for Beauty' is a good one to show your friends who wonder exactly how risque a Pre-Code can get.

Also, you'll be waiting for quite some time for Ida Lupino to appear, before you realise she's the nearly unrecognisable girl with the Jean Harlow eyebrows.

Post by **Mike Gebert** » Thu Apr 28, 2011 8:47 am

I thought the Claudette Colbert one, Torch Singer, was pretty entertaining in a breezy way, and Hot Saturday is a solid little film (I saw it at Cinesation a few years back). It's a good set... but I agree with those who wonder why certain other more obviously pre-Codeish titles didn't make it in place of one or two of these.

didi-5 · Post by **didi-5** » Wed May 04, 2011 3:36 pm

I have the Universal and all three Forbidden Hollywoods (will there be a fourth one?). Have enjoyed all of them so far.

Wasn't there an RKO pre-code set released as DVD-R only?

Changsham · Post by **Changsham** » Wed May 04, 2011 5:06 pm

didi-5 wrote:I have the Universal and all three Forbidden Hollywoods (will there be a fourth one?). Have enjoyed all of them so far.

Wasn't there an RKO pre-code set released as DVD-R only?

Would that be the RKO Lost and Found Collection or other? Looking at the description on the TCM shop site two of the six titles on this set are not from the Precode era. And it says nothing about them being DVD-R

mndean · Post by **mndean** » Wed May 04, 2011 11:28 pm

Mike Gebert wrote:I thought the Claudette Colbert one, Torch Singer, was pretty entertaining in a breezy way, and Hot Saturday is a solid little film (I saw it at Cinesation a few years back). It's a good set... but I agree with those who wonder why certain other more obviously pre-Codeish titles didn't make it in place of one or two of these.

I enjoyed those films also, but my thoughts are as you said, to put some more punch into the set thereby getting us to buy the next one. As likable as Torch Singer was, the travails of a single mom could've waited until the next set. I'd let Hot Saturday in, just for the commercial value of having early Cary Grant, and it's very watchable. Search For Beauty is a personal favorite - I liked that it swiped bits from the career of the notorious Bernarr MacFadden. I guess each of us could make our own precode collection of Universal-owned properties, and they'd all be different.

Michael O'Regan · Post by **Michael O'Regan** » Thu May 19, 2011 3:52 am

MURDER AT THE VANITIES -excellent

SEARCH FOR BEAUTY - strange but also excellent. It's made me an instant
fan of Gertrude Michael.

HOT SATURDAY - mediocre, insubstantial.

CliffordWeimer · Post by **CliffordWeimer** » Thu May 19, 2011 8:19 am

Including the entire written text of the Production Code as a bonus was great....

Michael O'Regan · Post by **Michael O'Regan** » Thu May 19, 2011 11:49 am

CliffordWeimer wrote:Including the entire written text of the Production Code as a bonus was great....

Yes.
Nice touch and interesting reading.

Changsham · Post by **Changsham** » Fri Jul 22, 2011 5:56 pm

Got my copy of this Universal Precode set. Generally much different in flavour and more varied in content to the TCM Forbidden Hollywood series. I found the youth culture orientated Hot Saturday and Search for Beauty quite novel for the period.They seem to hark back to the flapper days of the twenties or even fast forward to the 60s/70s.

The best film for me was Murder at the Vanities. This would have to be one of the most outrageously entertaining musicals I have ever seen. Why it is so obscure I don't understand. Blends music, theatre, comedy, crime, drama and dozens of scantly clad chorus girls seamlessly at breakneck speed and is a film I can enjoy over and over again. Is also longer than the usual pre code offerings at around 90 minutes. The best musical number in this film for me was "Live and Love Tonight" sung by Carl Brissom. The choreograhy by Larry Ceballos in creating a sea of chorus girls and feathers was amazing to watch. Carl Brissom and Kitty Carlisle in the lead roles when not singing are quite wooden and bland and play their roles straight but contrast well with the craziness of all the other supporting characters. Dorothy Stickney as the waif like maid steals all the scenes shes in. Gertrude Michael plays the uber bitch diva to perfection. Jack Oakey and Victor McLaglan provide most of the humour.

Torch Singer, Merrily we go to Hell and The Cheat are also good representative pre code films. Sound and picture quality was also very good. Nice work was done here. Search for Beauty, Merrily we go to Hell and Hot Saturday were the best preserved of the lot. Very few extras are provided but are superfluous as this is a strong collection. This set is certainly worth owning and on par with the TCM offerings. I hope they follow up with a volume 2 edition.

didi-5 · Post by **didi-5** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 12:27 pm

Changsham wrote:
didi-5 wrote:I have the Universal and all three Forbidden Hollywoods (will there be a fourth one?). Have enjoyed all of them so far.

Wasn't there an RKO pre-code set released as DVD-R only?
Would that be the RKO Lost and Found Collection or other? Looking at the description on the TCM shop site two of the six titles on this set are not from the Precode era. And it says nothing about them being DVD-R

You're right, some are pre-Code and some aren't. They are definitely DVD-R though. See http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/36228/tc ... ollection/ for confirmation of this. I must admit this + the high price tag has put me off buying it.

sethb · Post by **sethb** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 2:36 pm

Changsham wrote: The best film for me was Murder at the Vanities. This would have to be one of the most outrageously entertaining musicals I have ever seen. Why it is so obscure I don't understand.

I would guess that its obscurity is partially due to its content; after the Production Code was implemented in 1934, there was no way this movie could be reissued without cutting most of the musical numbers and a fair amount of dialogue. Of course, today the numbers are considered only slightly risque', and while some of the dialogue is not quite "PC", it's certainly not objectionable.

I agree the film is very entertaining, with the lovely Vanities numbers and the halfway decent murder plot, and I'm glad it was reissued. And was that Charles Middleton in the bit part as the half-crazed Shakespearean actor?

My only concern was the quality of the reissue, which looked "dupey" to me; the sound was unusually hissy as well. Either the DVD transfer was not so great, or more likely the transfer used second or third-generation elements, which may have been all that was available at this point. SETH

Jim Reid · Post by **Jim Reid** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 3:16 pm

I don't think that Murder at the Vanities was in the tv package due to the Marijuana number. It it had a big star in it like W.C. Fields, they might have just cut the number like they did with International House.

Post by **Danny Burk** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 4:18 pm

Print quality of the Universal-owned Paramount films is very uneven. When the package was sold to MCA in the late 1950s, prints were delivered as cheaply as possible with little regard to proper labwork or finding the best material.

mndean · Post by **mndean** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 6:17 pm

sethb wrote:
Changsham wrote:
My only concern was the quality of the reissue, which looked "dupey" to me; the sound was unusually hissy as well. Either the DVD transfer was not so great, or more likely the transfer used second or third-generation elements, which may have been all that was available at this point. SETH

I used to be so happy to see any precode DVD that I wouldn't carp about quality. Later, I got fussier, as with the Gold Diggers of 1933 disk in the Busby Berkeley set. With some of the titles, I would bet there is no better material but I wish they'd at least note that on the sets.

LouieD · Post by **LouieD** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 10:42 pm

mndean wrote:Later, I got fussier, as with the Gold Diggers of 1933 disk in the Busby Berkeley set.

Really??? After I read your post I watched the DVD again tonight and I can't see why there would be any problem with the transfer on this title. Can you explain your statement??

Post by **Mike Gebert** » Sat Aug 27, 2011 10:44 pm

The best film for me was Murder at the Vanities. This would have to be one of the most outrageously entertaining musicals I have ever seen. Why it is so obscure I don't understand.

I will say that it was featured prominently in Films Incorporated's "Rediscovering the American Cinema" catalog, doubtless because the marijuana references made it popular on college campuses in the 70s and 80s. Hey, I booked it!

Richard M Roberts · Post by **Richard M Roberts** » Sun Aug 28, 2011 2:16 am

Jim Reid wrote:I don't think that Murder at the Vanities was in the tv package due to the Marijuana number. It it had a big star in it like W.C. Fields, they might have just cut the number like they did with International House.

Oh yeah, there were EMKA prints on MURDER AT THE VANITIES, and I believe some had the "Marijuana" number in them, and there were many circulating 16mm copies both original and dupes of just that number obviously excised from various prints by various TV stations.

I just wish they'd have hired Bela Lugosi to re-create his role from the original Broadway version.

RICHARD M ROBERTS

Pre-code set.

Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.

Re:

Re: Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.

Re: Pre-code set.