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Bad Girl  /  Secrets

Bad Girl (1931)
July 26, 2015 - 7:00 pm
Billy Wilder Theater

Bad Girl  (1931)


Director Frank Borzage earned his second Oscar for directing with this thoughtful Depression-era domestic drama.  A young man and woman (James Dunn and Sally Eilers) meet, fall in love, and struggle to make a life for themselves in a New York tenement.  The story is quintessential Borzage even as he edges his unqualified sympathy for the struggling couple with subtle social commentary.

Production: Fox Film Corp.  Distribution: Fox Film Corp.  Producer: Frank Borzage.  Director: Frank Borzage.  Based on the novel Bad Girl, by Viña Delmar and the play of the same name by Viña Delmar and Brian Marlowe.  Screenwriter: Edwin Burke.  Cinematographer: Chester Lyons.  Art Director: William Darling.  Editor: Margaret Clancy.  With: James Dunn, Sally Eilers, Minna Gombel, William Pawley.  35mm, b/w, 90 min.

Secrets  (1933)


In her final screen appearance Mary Pickford plays the daughter of a 19th century New England shipping magnate whisked away to California by Leslie Howard’s office clerk.  From a fairytale opening to the brutalism of the frontier, director Frank Borzage strikes a number of registers in returning to Besier and Eddington’s play to chart love’s perseverance from first bloom to old age.

Production: The Pickford Corp.  A Frank Borzage Production.  Distribution: United Artists Corp.  Producer: Frank Borzage.  Director: Frank Borzage.  Based on the play Secrets by Rudolf Besier and May Edginton.  Screenwriter: Frances Marion.  Cinematographer: Ray June.  Art Direction: Richard Day.  Editor: Hugh Bennett.  Music: Alfred Newman.  With: Mary Pickford, Leslie Howard, C. Aubrey Smith, Blanche Friderici, Doris Lloyd.  35mm, b/w, 90 min.

Part of: 
7th Heaven: The Films of Frank Borzage