She Done Him Wrong stars Mae West as, well, a typical Mae West character. She's a saloon singer in the Bowery during the so-called Gay Nineties who's involved with several men, one of them a convict named Chick Clark (Owen Moore) who escapes from prison and is on his way to see her. She has, unsurprisingly, been less than faithful during his year-long absence and begins to fear what might happen upon his return when he discovers the other men she's been seeing. Another man she’s intrigued by is Serge Stanieff (Gilbert Roland), who’s working with criminals Gus Jordan (Noah Beery) and Russian Rita (Rafaela Ottiano) but who West sizes up when they meet just in case he might be material for later action. And then there’s Cary Grant (yes, Cary Grant!) as a missionary who keeps stopping by the saloon where West’s Lady Lou works and lives. You really didn’t expect that a Mae West film would only feature one love interest, did you?
Grant, in one of his first featured roles, actually plays the leader of a local temperance league, and West sets her sights on him as soon as she meets him. The mission’s in trouble, and Lou secretly does her best to make sure he’s able to keep his building, a very generous act for someone who’s clearly angling for him to pay attention to her. All of this is done with a bit of a sideways grin, and you can't take any of it too seriously. The film certainly has a brisk pace, clocking in at about 66 minutes long, reportedly making it the shortest film ever nominated for Best Picture.
Considering the brevity of the film, it’s quite surprising that West’s character doesn’t even show up until about nine minutes into the movie. We instead get a montage of the street, including an organ grinder’s monkey, horses and wagons, ladies walking, and a band playing. There’s even a shot involving some very huge glasses of beer. We even see her portrait, allegedly, above the bar in the saloon, a large nude rendition of her that doesn’t particularly look like her. She then rides up in a buggy to the chagrin of the women in town and waves from the men. She describes herself as “one of the finest women ever walked the streets.” Of course, she is.
What follows, plot-wise, is almost like a series of vignettes rather than a necessarily coherent narrative. We learn, for example, that Gus and Rita are running what a prostitution ring. When a young woman named Sally runs into the saloon and attempts to commit suicide, it’s Gus and Rita (and Serge) who promise to help her. Little does everyone realize that they’re going to force her into working as a prostitute. That’s not their only crime, naturally, but it’s the one that quickly gets the attention of Grant’s Captain Cummings. Since West was one of the co-writers of the screenplay, you can bet she knew the implications of that name.
Lou goes to visit her boyfriend Chick in prison, but he threatens to kill her if she’s been unfaithful. She calms him down by claiming that she’s been waiting for only him, which seems unlikely given that she knows every single convict in the prison. She even calls out two prisoners who seem, well, very close to each other, dubbing them “the Cherry Sisters.” Maybe that’s why it was called the “Gay Nineties.” Thinking she’s calmed Chick down, she returns to the saloon and to her incessant flirting with various men.
West sings a few songs during the movie, most notably "Frankie and Johnny," but her renditions of “I Wonder Where My Easy Rider’s Gone” and “A Guy What Takes His Time” serve to amuse the audience in the saloon and those watching the film. She is also sewn into some pretty spectacular gowns and cinched very tight at the waist. There’s not a moment in the film when she isn’t sparkly or frilly or covered in diamonds and sequins – or sometimes all of those at once. Even her room upstairs in the saloon is fantastic. It’s filled with Victorian furniture and all kinds of knickknacks. The production designers and costume designers here did amazing work.
The best part of a Mae West film, though, is the dialog, especially the zingers. Almost every line she speaks is a double entendre. Actually, many of them aren’t even that; they’re too direct to be an entendre. I mean, when Grant’s Captain Cummings tries to put handcuffs on her, she reminds him that “hands aren’t everything.” This is also the film where she gets to deliver one of her most famous lines: "Why don't you come up some time and see me?" But she also shares this bit of folk wisdom: “Listen, when women go wrong, men go right after them.” When her maid Pearl (Louise Beavers) says that she wouldn’t want a police officer to catch her without a petticoat, Lou responds, “No policeman? What about a nice fireman?” And then there’s one of my favorites: “You know, it was a toss-up whether I go in for diamonds or sing in the choir. The choir lost.” You don’t get this many laughs in such a short period of time outside of a slapstick comedy.
All of the plotlines come to a head when Chick breaks out of jail and makes his way to the saloon. That’s when Russian Rita learns that Serge has given Lou a gift that was meant originally for her. Somehow Chick and another man to whom Lou is connected, Dan Flynn, wind up in her room while she’s performing, and Chick kills Dan. Grant shows up, reveals that he’s an undercover agent nicknamed “The Hawk,” and either arrests or shoots almost everyone on the screen. Instead of arresting Lou, Captain Cummings takes her away in a carriage and puts a ring on her finger. It’s a bit of a shock given how much he obviously knows about her past, but I suppose a happy ending is in order even for a comedy like this one.
Discovering that She Done Him Wrong was nominated for the Outstanding Production Oscar came as a bit of a shock. Perhaps the Academy nominated it in an attempt to snub the newly formed Catholic Legion of Decency, an organization that cited West and this film (with its hints of promiscuity, especially by a woman) as one of the reasons for its creation. It certainly wouldn't be the last time that the Academy sided with controversial films in its long history.
Oscar Nomination: Outstanding Production
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