Some Good Performers In This MADAME X-style Movie

Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

George Bancroft and Wynne Gibson in Lady and Gent (1932)

John Archer, Carol Hughes, and Guy Kibbee in Scattergood Baines (1941)

Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake in This Gun for Hire (1942)

Geraldine Carr, Marlo Dwyer, Arthur Franz, and Marie Windsor in The Sniper (1952)

Wynne Gibson and Jean Hersholt in The Crime of the Century (1933)

Miriam Hopkins in The Story of Temple Drake (1933)

Paul Guilfoyle, Doris Merrick, and Lloyd Nolan in Time to Kill (1942)

Wynne Gibson and Russell Gleason in The Strange Case of Clara Deane (1932)

Wynne Gibson

Pat O&apos;Brien

Dudley Digges

Arthur M. Brilant

Max Marcin

A young dress designer marries an insurance agent. They soon have a daughter, but what the wife doesn&apos;t know is that her husband is actually a criminal, who soon involves her--unwittingly--in a robbery. Sentenced to prison, she gi...

Louis J. Gasnier

The Strange Case of Clara Deane

It&apos;s 1912 and Wynne Gibson has a great career as a dress designer for Lee Kohlmer. She throws it all over to get married to insurance agent Pat O&apos;Brien. Soon they have a daughter, Cora Sue Collins, but O&apos;Brien isn&apos;t working so steadily at selling insurance any more. In fact, he&apos;s a gangster, as Miss Gibson discovers when they&apos;re out for a joyride and he commits robbery and shoots down a pursuing cop. Miss Gibson goes to prison too. When she gets out, she wants to see her daughter, who has grown up to be Frances Dee, the adopted daughter of Police Inspector Dudley Digges -- great onomatopoeia, that, he should have stayed a detective -- who thinks thinks her unnamed parents are dead.

It&apos;s got a bit of a MADAME X vibe to it, as you can see, and the casting is very interesting, with Digges holding the acting honors. He was one of those supporting actors of the 1930s wo would turn up in good pictures, do his bit as a minor authority figure, and get offscreen, leaving the stars very much. I&apos;m not so fond of Miss Gibson&apos;s performance; as the lead, she should be more interested, but she plays the character as depressed and hesitant.... and depressed characters rarely do anything particularly interesting.

There&apos;s been some mention of the poor image quality of these pre-code Paramounts that have been showing up recently, and that&apos;s understandable. They look like TV prints that were recorded off the air 40 years ago. They probably were. Yet the sound tracks always seem to be in good shape.

It's 1912 and Wynne Gibson has a great career as a dress designer for Lee Kohlmer. She throws it all over to get married to insurance agent Pat O'Brien. Soon they have a daughter, Cora Sue Collins, but O'Brien isn't working so steadily at selling insurance any more. In fact, he's a gangster, as Miss Gibson discovers when they're out for a joyride and he commits robbery and shoots down a pursuing cop. Miss Gibson goes to prison too. When she gets out, she wants to see her daughter, who has grown up to be Frances Dee, the adopted daughter of Police Inspector Dudley Digges -- great onomatopoeia, that, he should have stayed a detective -- who thinks thinks her unnamed parents are dead.

It's got a bit of a MADAME X vibe to it, as you can see, and the casting is very interesting, with Digges holding the acting honors. He was one of those supporting actors of the 1930s wo would turn up in good pictures, do his bit as a minor authority figure, and get offscreen, leaving the stars very much. I'm not so fond of Miss Gibson's performance; as the lead, she should be more interested, but she plays the character as depressed and hesitant.... and depressed characters rarely do anything particularly interesting.

There's been some mention of the poor image quality of these pre-code Paramounts that have been showing up recently, and that's understandable. They look like TV prints that were recorded off the air 40 years ago. They probably were. Yet the sound tracks always seem to be in good shape.

A young dress designer marries an insurance agent. They soon have a daughter, but what the wife doesn't know is that her husband is actually a criminal, who soon involves her--unwittingly--in a robbery. Sentenced to prison, she gives up her baby for adoption. When she is released 15 years later, she sets out to find her long-lost daughter. A police inspector gets involved in her search and, for reasons of his own, tries to dissuade her from finding her child.

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The Strange Case of Clara Deane

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