The Circus (1928), Footlight Parade (1933), The Scarlet Empress (1934), One Way Passage (1932), Heroes for Sale (1933), Employees' Entrance (1933), Three on a Match (1932), Bombshell (1933) ... Let's take a look at the ranked list of the best Pre Code Film movies.
Storyline: Unscrupulous investigator of lost heirs Jimmy Corrigan loses his love Joan Martin to apparently upright competitor James Wallingham. He counters by adding a veneer of respectability to his own operation. Meanwhile he exposes Wallingham for a fraud.—Ed Stephan <stephan@cc.wwu.edu>
Plot Keywords: train crash, train, speedboat, face slap, wedding ring, bigamy, marriage of convenience ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: A sexy young manicurist living with her older backwoodsman husband in a small Canadian town finds herself attracted to a young, rich and famous divorce lawyer who comes to town on vacation.
Plot Keywords: canadian, trading post, cigarette smoking, canada, female protagonist, playing footsie, pre code film ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: A telephone operator at an opulent hotel falls in love with a young man who turns out to be a rich oil millionaire.
Plot Keywords: hotel manager, desk clerk, cigarette smoking, slang, flapper, 1920s, cigar smoking ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Jerry Strong's the son of a wealthy businessman, but he wants to be a painter. He hires Kay Arnold, a woman with a questionable past, as a model. They fall in love, and plan to get married. But Jerry's parents raise strong objections.—John Oswalt <jao@jao.com>
Plot Keywords: attempted suicide, rowboat, player piano, artist, model, party, flapper ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Russian refugee Tanya Borisoff is suddenly abandoned penniless in Rangoon, Burma, by her lover, Tony Evans, who accepted a gunrunning deal from Nick, the owner of an amoral nightclub. Nick made the deal hoping to get Tanya as his main "hostess," which Tanya accepts after an initial refusal, just to make the best of a bad situation. She becomes notorious using the name "Spot White," but her affairs cause the commissioner of police to deport her. She reminds the commissioner of a previous tryst he had with her and extorts 10,000 rupees from him with which to make a new life. She uses a new name, Marjorie Lang, going to Mandalay, Burma, via the Irrawadi River by steamer, where she meets alcoholic Dr. Gregory Burton, who is on his way to help in an area plagued with a deadly contagious fever. As they slowly fall in love, she learns he's doing that to make amends for once operating on a patient while drunk, causing his death. She decides to go with him so they can put their pasts behind them together. But Tony is on the steamer too, and tries to convince Tanya he still loves her. Tony gets a wire from Nick telling him the police are on his trail and will pick him up at the next port, so he leaves evidence to suggest he took poison and jumped overboard, but actually he hides in the hold of the boat. The captain finds the evidence and believes Tanya murdered Tony, but at the urging of Dr. Burton and the first mate who finds the wire, he finally decides it was a suicide and frees her. When Tony returns to an astonished Tanya, he tries to convince her to open a club with him in Mandalay, where she could be a "hostess" again. Through with that life, she eyes the poison still in the cabin as Tony asks her to make him a drink.—Arthur Hausner <genart@volcano.net>
Plot Keywords: prostitution, location in title, potboiler, vindication, actress billed above the title, retribution, held at gunpoint ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Cassie has come to New York and goes to work as a model where her friend Gladys works. She falls in love with wealthy young Jerry who is already married. Gladys has the same probelm with her man Phelps.—Ed Stephan <stephan@cc.wwu.edu>
Plot Keywords: suicide, wealth, waiter, usa, prohibition, new york city, marital problem ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Spirited singer and dancer Connie (Helen Twelvetrees) charms a radio station executive, John Bradley (Victor Jory), when he spots her performing in a Panama nightclub. Connie hits it off with John and visits him in New York City. However, what she really wants is a gig for Chick ...
Plot Keywords: greed, song, singer, singing, reprisal, retribution, nightclub singer ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: High school students band together to dispense vigilante justice against a vicious gangland boss.
Plot Keywords: greed, cigarette smoking, racial stereotype, prohibition era, newspaper story, newspaper reporter, defense attorney ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Nellie Rimplegar has to tell her grown children that due to her bungled handling of their finances, the family has been wiped out by the Stock Market crash. Friend and family doctor, Alan Stevens, tells them they'll all need to eliminate their extravagant ways and get jobs. Stevens also rents a room in their house more as a way to be near pretty Elizabeth Rimplegar, than to help their finances. Stevens faces competition from Elizabeth's beau, Ronald, a free-loading writer who remains oblivious to her money woes.—Daniel Bubbeo <dbubbeo@cmp.com>
Plot Keywords: great depression, singing, singer, song, money problems, landlady, snobbery ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Joe has Cowboy-Race Driver Brent drive him to the border where his men slug Brent, and he shoots Stafford and takes his bonds. Brent's old friend Chuck arrives and the two head out to find the gang and recover the bonds.
Plot Keywords: sword fight, bartender, barfly, treachery, violence, vindication, pre code film ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Nekhlyudov, a Russian nobleman serving on a jury, discovers that the young girl on trial, Katusha, is someone he once seduced and abandoned and that he himself bears responsibility for reducing her to crime. He sets out to redeem her and himself in the process.—Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net>
Plot Keywords: pre code film, socialism, communism, held at gunpoint, poverty, betrayal, cigarette smoking ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: A dedicated young doctor places his patients above everyone else in his life. Unfortunately, his social register fianceé can't accept the fact that he considers an appointment in the operating room more important that attending a cocktail party. He soon drifts into an affair with a pretty nurse who shares his passion for healing.—Daniel Bubbeo <dbubbeo@cmp.com>
Plot Keywords: engagement, physician, fiancee, brooklyn bridge, terminal cancer, board of directors, heiress ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: A poor but honest and hardworking waitress from way across the tracks meets and falls in love with a college student from the upper-stuffy class, but the Mama of the intended objects to the romance. Her objections even lead her to having the waitress framed and sent to a prison work-farm for three months. Upon her release, the waitress finds instant stardom in the show business...and the social class she was lacking. Big Mama withdraws her objections.—Les Adams <longhorn1939@suddenlink.net>
Plot Keywords: waitress, bribery, avalanche, aunt niece relationship, photographer, judge, frenchman ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: Hank owns horses, stables horses and races horses. He favorite horse always wins and he is prosperous and will known. His son (Bob), however dreams only of the future of the horseless carriage and not of the horse. This causes problems between Hank and Bob. As the people in the town convert from horses to autos, Hank detests those who switch - so he looses his friends, his son Bob and finally his livery business. Bob leaves his flame Rose and goes to Detroit, gets involved with the auto industry and does very well. He does not forget Hank and promises to see him again, but Hank's hatred of the auto may cause the death of Bob.—Tony Fontana <tony.fontana@spacebbs.com>
Plot Keywords: whip, sabotage, practical joke, joke, inventor, fire, fight ...
Movie Details Click Here!Storyline: A lonely husband whose wife has been away hires a lookalike impersonator to fill his place and fool his mother-in-law while he plays around with a pretty coquette. Confusion prevails when his wife returns that evening.
Plot Keywords: pre code film, locked in a room, misunderstanding, female in shower, secretary, butler, lawyer ...
Movie Details Click Here!