Spring Silence... Kennington Bioscope 9th Annual Silent Weekend Day Two

 

This is Part Three of the Cinema Museum Silent Spring long weekend, I’m putting my hot takes out in reverse order because… why not!? A brilliant few days incorporating the British Silent Film Symposium 2026 run by Kings College London and the 9^th Kennington Bioscope Weekender.

 

Ypres (1925) with Cyrus Gabrysch, introduced by Lawrence Napper

“… fantasy must cower before the stark realities of mankind’s agony – such as Ypres.”

Former soldier Blair Philips writing in The Stoll Herald, November 1925¹

Philips was qualifying his description of this film as being like a “dream…” emerging from “the mist of yesterday…” which would still be a living nightmare for those who survived one of the bloodiest and most desperate battles of the Great War.

Directed by Walter Summers, using a mix of reconstructions of the Battle of Ypres mixed with contemporary footage from both side, this was one of a number of films aiming to pay tribute to the loses and bravery of a nation still in mourning. Produced for British Instructional Pictures, Ypres followed on from The Battle of Jutland (1921), Armageddon (1923) and Zeebrugge (1924) in this approach and also focused on the experience of individuals to humanise the almost inconceivable events.

A series of maps are also used to show how the British and Commonwealth soldiers in particular were able to, just about, defend the Ypres Salient – a bulging line of attack/defence which emerged as the warring parties fought their way up through North-Western Europe as the Germans attempted to outflank their opposition and cut off supplies from the French ports. It’s a film and a series of events I could easily spend a lot more time on – so watch this space and read Lawrence’s book (link below).

Summers manages to make an entertaining as well as instructional film and the comic asides were more necessary for the audience then rather than now, although we don’t have to look far to see the horrors of war as filtered through the modern apparatus of “instruction”.

“Whole companies were annihilated and the marvel is how anyone remained to break up the infantry attacks which were delivered again and again.”

An officer of the 1st Gloucestershire’s who was at Gheluvelt

 

Rediscoveries and restorations Part II, with John Sweeney, introductions from Dave Glass and Glenn Mitchell

The Cattle Rustler’s End (1911), starring J. Warren Kerrigan as Curley Temple (Shirley not!?)  and Pauline Bush as his sweetheart Fannie, was a pacey tale of illicit love and cattle theft directed by a young Allan Dwan. Fannie’s father disapproves and so the couple meet by a tree where, unfortunately, a cattle rustler has also hidden the branding tools of his evil trade. One thing leads to another and Curley is accused and, as usual, it’s left to the woman to sort things out. This was another rare gem transferred from a nitrate 35mm print for digital restoration by Bob Geoghegan’s Archive Film Agency.

Racing for Life (1924), a five-reeler directed by Henry MacRae and starring Eva Novak and William Fairbanks, featured some extensive time-dilation as motor cars raced around their practice lap and, in the minute or so of elapsed time, our hero, seemingly miles away, has to fight off his kidnappers – including his own brother – race on foot, steal a police motorbike and run across the track to the pit in order to start half a lap behind the others.

This was, without doubt, great fun though and, coming on 35mm from Tony Saffrey’s collection, almost the first time in a century that this extraordinary race has been seen and it was a thrill!!

There was also time for a quick Mabel Normand film, Mabel lost and Won (1915) from Bob Geoghegan’s collection and which is so rare it doesn’t even have an IMDB page! Once again the KB brings you the rarest of the rare as well as the finest of everything else (yes, I work in marketing and I cannot lie!).

 

Charles Vanel, one man alone with his cod...

Pêcheur d’Islande (Fishers of the Isle) (1924), with Stephen Horne, introduction by Liz Cleary

I was rather grumpy (Liverpool FC might have lost again?) when watching this in Pordenone in 2023 but this film was transformed for me here with Liz Cleary’s introduction being a large part of that. Liz became interested not just in the film but in the novel from which it was drawn, as well as the location and the way of life depicted, being driven to find out more and even to visit the locations. Inspiration is infectuous but she also added so much context to enable me to see the strength and purpose of the film.

Perhaps it’s also as I’ve just watched Rose of Nevada, Mark Jenkin’s new film about the lives of trawlers on a small fishing boat. If you go to Whitby, Fleetwood or former fishing villages such as Aberdaron in North Wales, you will see grave after grave marking generations of deaths at sea and for this reason too, the film’s downbeat yet also inspiring narrative rings so true. Without giving any spoilers away, sometimes in cinema deaths have to actually mean something and not simply be a plot point… Also, the exhausting practicalities of line fishing here and trawling as in Rose are humbling in themselves.

Pierre Loti abides...

Liz’s pilgrimage to the film’s locations, Paimpol and Ploubazlanec in northern Brittany, gave us a sense of the unchanging waters and she also gave us the background of former naval seaman Pierre Loti’s 1886 novel on which the film is based. Loti was an extraordinary character as the photograph above might suggest and the story drew on his experience of the Far East as well as the Atlantic – his ability was in his description of the land and the sea and director Jacques de Baroncelli crafts a poetic tale that pulls the viewer in with stunning locations, and compositions as characters fade in and out of each other’s thoughts: the shooting of one character features flashing images of his loved ones in the manner of Abel Gance.

Charles Vanel – who really did have an issue with transport in his career (c.f. The Wages of Fear) – is an unknowable rock of conflicted emotion as Yann the fisherman and elfin Sandra Milovanoff is sadly beguiling as Gaud – the woman who does battle with his affection for the stormy seas.

Stephen Horne’s accompaniment included Breton folk songs as well as his own improvisations, as usual it made for the perfect connection between the sentiments and the time.

 

Harry, Bebe and Snub play with shoes

Focus on… Rolin’ with Glenn Mitchell and Dave Glass, accompaniment John Sweeney

Glenn Mitchell and Dave Glass resumed their ongoing mission by discussing the history and early output of Hal Roach’s Rolin’ company before it rebranded as the Hal Roach Studio and the Kings of Comedy did battle – Sennet vs Roach! Here we find a number of soon to be extremely famous folk such as Snub Pollard, Bebe Daniel’s and Harold Lloyd, just not the Harry we’re that familiar with.

Initially Lloyd played the role of Willie Work in one-reelers but by 1915 “Chaplinitis” was in full bloom and he wore an odd two-whisp moustache and tight-trampy clothes as Lucky Luke – the Chaplin you can meet between reels?  Giving them Fits (1915) was Lloyd, Pollard and teenage Daniels’ debut for the company and is a riotous tale of events in a shoe shop in which Harry is for some reason called Luke the Fluke – a chance-based play on words.

Luke proved popular enough to move to two-reels and under his own name, “Lukes” as opposed to Rolin’s. Pollard also got his own series and in 1918 Roach started making films with a fellow called Stan Laurel and the rest was, eventually, history. You can’t help but be infected by Glenn and Dave’s enthusiasm and this reflects the high energies of these wonderful comedies and the fast-developing world of the business of laughter on screen: there was no luck involved, just talent and application.

Irene (1926), with Stephen Horne, introduction by Kelly Robinson

Colleen Moore knew the score alright and she was one of the most vivacious personas cinema has ever seen: an icon of the Jazz Age who even had an F. Scott Fitzgerald-autographed mini-copy of The Great Gatsby in the library of her legendary dolls house. Kelly Robinson showed the evidence in her introduction to this zippy film which showcased Moore at the height of her powers and popularity.

Directed by Alfred E Green, Colleen plays the titular Irish-American as the daughter of the Ma and Pa O’Dare – played by Cork’s wonderful Kate Price (who even mimes in Oirish) and Charles Murray who presents as drunk for most of the story. Is it just me or whether The Irish only ever drunk and/or policemen in most silent films? Anyway, Irene is the scatty but definitely smart heart of the family of five, sorry foive!, who scrape by in an apartment until she loses her job.

Madame Lucy – whose business motto is “Pay cash – look what happened to the Light Brigade – they charged!”

Colleen and Kate from Cork

After being kicked out by Ma who, y’know, was only joking… Irene moves to New York and gets a job – that luck of the Irish! – delivering parcels to the posh estates on the Boston Park Road. This is where she meets handsome and likable rich person Donald Marshall (Lloyd Hughes) who has just invested in a fashion house run by one Madame Lucy who, you’ll never believe… is Aberdeen’s George K. Arthur who inherited his aunt’s business and her name, somehow?

Lucy declares that to make any woman beautiful is a simple art and, well, soon Irene arrives with some parcels and Donald decides she should be the proof of this theory – much to “Madame’s” dismay. Irene asks for two pals to accompany her – there’s a lot of female solidarity in the film – and Lucy spends most of the remaining storyline extremely unconvinced to comic effect of course. I like George in this role and he sparks well with Colleen’s feisty resilience.

There’s a grand finale at a fashion show that was filmed in Technicolor and on the BFI’s 35mm print this has faded so the section from a copy held in Russia was used – it was colourful but lower quality, Moore’s smile radiated through though. It’s another fine exhibit in the case for Colleen Moore being one of the stars of the age and of enduring charm. My Gen-Z daughter was impressed with her pep and sisterly attitude, especially when sharing roller skates with another late-night reveller who missed the last bus.

Stephen Horne accompanied with the style and verve Colleen demands – Moore not less! A good time was had by all!!

Sadly, I had to away before the grand finale with the UK premier of the latest restoration of The Three Musketeers (1921). It’s available direct from the Film Preservation Society on Blu-ray and hopefully will be screened somehow and somewhere else.

 

A fabulous long weekend of silent frolicking – details of Day One and the Silent Film Symposium to follow in the coming days… Thank you to all at the KB and KC!

 

1.       The Great War in Popular British Cinema of the 1920s: Before Journey’s End, Lawrence Napper, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)

Double Bebe… She’s a Sheik (1927)/Miss Bluebeard (1925), with Meg Morley and Lillian Henley, Kennington Bioscope

Tonight, Kevin Brownlow had promised us a surprise from his own collection and he delivered with a 16mm transfer of She’s a Sheik that hasn’t been projected in public since I was in short pants (no, even earlier than that troublesome New Romantic period…). The film had been transferred by a British collector using ex-air force equipment and yet looked pretty fine partly due to the extensive  repair work of the Bioscope’s ace projectionist Dave Locke.

Kevin described it as madcap like Hellzapoppin and whilst it doesn’t quite match the madness of that film it’s heart-warmingly daft with a welcome eye on gender-reversal that suits Bebe Daniel’s natural intelligence as well as William Powell’s willingness to never take himself that seriously. It’s a little patchy in parts but redeemed by Daniel’s making like Fairbanks as well as her old sparing partner Gloria and, of course, Mr Valentino.  No one can pet a peacock (not going there…) wearing an outrageous feathered head-dress quite like Bebe and she out smoulders Rudolph whilst lazily stroking a leopard which is clearly benefiting from the same kind of head doctor as the Happy Mondays in 1991.

William Powell is about to get his thawb handed to him

Bebe is a magnetic presence and a natural comedienne as she would show from the Mack Sennett days through to the wise-cracking screwballs of the thirties and beyond after she settled in the UK as Mrs Lyons (not Leopard you may note…). She has a striking, thoroughly-modern face and yet there’s always a twinkle… not so far from either Doug or Rudy then: these people had The Glamour alright.

So does William Powell and Richard Arlen for that matter, even when their characters are being humiliated by the film’s star. Bebe plays Zaida a good catholic Spanish girl who is the adopted daughter of Sheik Yusif ben Hamad (Paul McAllister … not many of us Paul’s get to be a Sheik!). The Sheik is fully supportive of her right to choose a marriage partner and very quickly she spies just the man, a French army officer, Captain Colton (Arlen), the trouble is he’s already seeing a blonde Wanda Fowler (Josephine Dunn) who Zaida spies two-timing him.

Reversing the, actually quite disturbing, kidnapping approach to courtship from other films about similar things, Zaida takes her Captain prisoner and quickly wins him over through basic womanly wiles and the offer of food, drink and a good pipe. But it’s at this point that the nasty Kada (Mr Powell) decides he’s going to take this woman himself and overcome the French forces… What do you reckon to his chances of either?

Dreamy duo: Richard Arlen and Bebe Daniels

Meg Morley accompanied having not even seen the film before and provided some luscious chords with period-jazz flavours, sweeping minor shapes that swept through the sand and patient, confident themes that embraced the unpredictability of the action and the unseen narrative.

Lilian Henley provided similar service for the first film with her own trademark polish and assurance. If Meg’s improvisational jazz background informs her approach perhaps Lillian’s experience as a professional actress informs her own highly-disciplined and sympathetic playing. I watched Ben Travers flapper farce Thark last week and it’s so close to Miss Bluebeard in style and I’m taking a wild guess here, I could easily imagine it’s one of Lillian’s favourite periods?

The film is not as zany as SAS and creakily shows its stage roots having been based on a play, Little Miss Bluebeard, by Avery Hopwood but does have its moments and some amazing costumery especially for Bebe to wear.

The plot is as convoluted as all get out and shows once again that you should never let anyone impersonate you as you can end up married or even in court (name that Colleen Moore film!). But successful composer Larry Charters (Robert Frazer) who is visiting Paris is so fed up of young women chasing him that he asks his mate Bob Hawley (Kenneth MacKenna) to impersonate him so he can focus on his writing.

He runs into stage actress Colette (see what they did there…) who is introduced in one of the film’s cleverest moments behaving on stage as we expect her character to behave in the film… and, one thing leads to another and a drunken mayor marries them (dontcha just hate it when that happens!).

So far, so what you may say but when Colette meets the real Larry it is, ow you say, l’amour at first sight (Colette has title card French to die for, n’est pas).

Robert Frazer, Martha O'Dwyer and Raymond Griffith

It gets complicated and really the funniest thing is the excellent Raymond Griffith trying to get some sleep as The Honourable Bertie Bird even whilst mostly wearing his trademark top hat.

Two sides to Bebe Daniels and proof that she could more than match anyone for comedy, swinging action and romance. Plus... Swanson and the lion? Yeah, got me a leopard.

Before Bebe we had a Christmas short, a British version of The Little Match Girl (1914) which was indeed short and bitter sweet with Meg accompanying.

This was all a fine way to finish off the year at the Bioscope. Here’s to 2018 and The Cinema Museum continuing to support this excellent enterprise.

You're twisting my leopard man...

She’s the love of your life… Why Change Your Wife? (1920) w Niki King Band, BFI BEV

A Cecil B DeMille romantic comedy might not seem an obvious choice for the second in the series of the Birds Eye View Film Festival Sounds and Silents. The strand celebrates women in film and in jazz playing along with film and, rightly or wrongly, DeMille is perhaps more thought of as an exploiter rather than promoter of women.  But as the programme notes pointed out there were a number of key female collaborators for Mr DeMille beyond the two master comics we saw on screen (more on Bebe and Gloria in a mo’…).

Anne Bauchens edited all of his films for over forty years and here, as in his other silents, her expertise is evident in smooth transitions and state of the art story pacing. The stunning gowns were designed by Natasha Rambova who went on to work on Nazimova’s Salome – and her fashions are very much the co-star of this film – as my wife said: if only it was in colour!

Bebe Daniels and Gloria Swanson

The script was written by Sada Louise Cowan and Olga Printzlau, for-knowledge of which helps to off-set any modern sexual-political misgivings to an extent with their witty script detailing how the marriage contract can make the heart go duller… if both parties are not careful.

Gloria Swanson’s star power tends to further shift any un-even-handedness: she’s the story fulcrum and the character we care most about and events tend to unfold at her pace. Why change your wife? She’s Gloria Swanson you fool!

As if that wasn’t enough, the alpha male DeMille’s work was further feminized by the live score provided by British jazz ace Niki King who’s cleverly composed song-track gave sympathetic voice to Swanson in particular. We knew who Niki was rooting for!

Aided by a band on organ, harp, double bass and drums, Ms King’s music made this one of the most syncopated and swinging silent evenings I’ve enjoyed at the BFI reflecting and reinforcing the relentless pace of the film. Maybe jazz is getting like Shakespeare? You need to be an exceptionally fluent player to really make it ring true to modern ears: the form is “old” but the meaning, the message and the passion is timeless. Niki King achieved this and in doing so helped to un-wrap a very fresh silent film for the audience.

Bebe Daniels and Thomas Meighan say cheers!

Why Change Your Wife? was one of a series of sex-comedies DeMille made around the turn of the twenties and it dealt with marriage in a very swinging, pre-code way… he always did get away with what he could in this area of human fantasy.

Gloria Swanson is Mrs Beth Gordon who is all too comfortably married to husband Robert (Thomas Meighan). They’re inability to co-ordinate their morning bathroom routines reflect their divergent cultural and personal interests. Beth throws herself into middle-brow improving books and listens to serious classical music whilst Bob just wants to tango and to go to the follies… there’s a slight gender inversion here: he’s the jazz baby?!

Bob gets with the beat

Robert decides to spice things up and goes to buy some racy evening wear for his wife. The clothes are modelled by young Sally Clark (Bebe Daniels) who has longed to run her fingers through his masculine curly hair since she was a teen. She makes a play by sexing up the clothes, draping them as low as she can and adding a pint of perfume and a heart to her bare shoulder… it doesn’t go un-noticed.

I’d always associated Daniels with talkies – especially 42^nd Street – but was surprised to find that she’d been an early comedy partner for Harold Lloyd in a number of his post-war shorts. That experience certainly holds her in good stead here and she is a match for Swanson in looks and timing: a comedy cat-fight is guaranteed.

Beth doesn’t like the clothes… why should she be forced into revealing her body just for male gratification? She stays at home to listen to her favourite violinist Radinioff (Theodore Kosloff) leaving Robert with no one to go to the show with… Sally’s arrival with a missing part of the dress prompts him to extend the invitation.

Sally and Robert enjoy the show and back at her flat – blimey they moved quickly in 1920 – Robert find out that they share the same record collection and interests (dancing… kissing…). It’s a late night and by the time he gets home it’s nearly two o’clock and, waking Beth up, she quickly rumbles him and divorce is immediately on the cards.

Robert steps over the mark...

So far so rom-com and so it goes as the marital twists and turns involving the lead characters follow their course as Beth decides that maybe she should show off more of her assets whilst new wife Sally even gets tangled up with the surprisingly butch Radinioff as emotional loyalties ebb and flow… towards a conclusion I won’t give away.

Why Change Your Wife? – supercharged by Niki King’s music – felt fresh, smart and knowing… these are very modern concerns handled with a smooth economy. Bebe Daniels’ naturalistic and expressive timing threatens to steal the show but Gloria Swanson is that perfect silent powerhouse and even over-matched in stature and looks your eyes are inevitably drawn to her intensity and direct communication. Someone who “spoke” straight to the watcher and who never takes our attentiveness for granted.

Rumbled

As for Ms King, her jazz adds a lot of modern flavouring to what could be otherwise well-worn swing. Pitch perfect and powerful she was a one-woman Greek chorus carefully matching words to the specific meanings of music and mood. I shall certainly be tracking her down to Ronnie Scott's for more.

Why Change Your Wife? is available on import DVD from Amazon whilst you can find Niki King’s music there as well as digital retailers such as eMusic. Niki's website is to be found here.

More information about the Birds Eye View Film Festival and Sounds and Silents is to be found here: they’ve given me renewed faith in Mr DeMille!

Beth's change of style had all the boys interested...

“Ready for my claws-up, Mr DeMille…” Male and Female (1919)

So much to admire about Cecil B. DeMille and so much to lay at his door...

A highly-gifted director, he created America’s first feature The Squaw Man in 1914 along with the adult sophistication of The Cheat a year later. He seemed to effortlessly create good-looking, seamless stories yet he found out what he thought audiences “really” wanted and started to give it to them – the first director to sell out or the first director to just cash in.

Amongst his key themes were an unashamed focus on his female leads coupled with a penchant for historical epics that enabled the depiction of less inhibited times and, simply put… less dressed times.

Gloria Swanson, Thomas Meighan and Lila Lee

Male and Female is an early template for this approach and there are clear comparisons with his later work… In 1932’s The Sign of the Cross it’s Claudette Colbert famously bathing in goat’s milk (it’s not pasteurised…it barely goes past her chest!) whilst here we have twenty-year old Gloria Swanson alone with just a few maids and a couple of cameramen in a giant and completely gratuitous sunken bath.

Gloria and Claudette take their baths

The later film has an extraordinary escalation of savage punishments with alligators and then gorillas moving in on bikini clad Christian girls tied under logs whereas Male and Female has the famous scene with La Swanson at the mercy of a lion: the no doubt heavily-drugged beast, just about capable of laying its paws on her unclothed back…

Scantily clad and in animal peril...1932 and 1919

Now, this is all very thrilling but is it good, honest film making or just the first major steps in the development of Cecil’s cinema of exploitation…?

Male and Female is an adaptation of JM Barrie’s highly successful stage play, The Admirable Crichton from 1902.  One feels that the themes of class and entitlement examined by the play’s dislocation of the “natural order” were played down in DeMille’s film… starting with the re-titling – “now, why didn’t I think of that…” Barrie sardonically commented.

The admirable Thomas Meighan

Never-the-less, things start well enough as DeMille shows the pampered household of Lord Loam (Theodore Roberts) and Lady Agatha 'Aggie' Lasenby (Mildred Reardon) and her family as they start their day: shoes cleaned, room service, maid-assisted bathing: all mod cons.

Holding this all together is the head butler, Crichton (Thomas Meighan) a man of supernatural calm who most assuredly knows his place and that of his staff. In spite of this, Crichton hankers after the affection of young Lady Mary Lasenby (Gloria Swanson) who, inspire of her indolence and high-level airs, has an allure the seasoned servant cannot resist – is this a crush based on position or can there ever be anything more for them… as people and as a man and woman.

Lila Lee and Crichton's shoe...

This situation is mirrored by the crush the young scullery maid, Tweeny (Lila Lee) has on Crichton…. He is out of her reach, devoted to the family and to one member above all others.

How the attract such devotion is hard to fathom as Lady Mary is rude and exacting, her cousin Honourable Ernest 'Ernie' Wolley (Raymond Hatton) is a wastrel and even her intended Lord Brockelhurst (Robert Cain) seems more interested in other women… almost all of them. Clearly Mary could do better… but how? These people seem the victims of their status almost as much as the people in their service.

Go on a boat?!

Someone has the bright idea to go on a cruise and they take their servants and other possessions with them. All is going swimmingly for a while with the toffs actually fairly bored by the rigours of the wider ocean… But all this changes as the ship is driven onto rocks by a distracted sailor and so begins the fight of their lives.

The family manage to escape to a desert island (in reality, just off the coast of Santa Barbara) where Crichton soon proves his worth, much to the chagrin of his betters who cannot see why he feels so empowered – he may be able to start fires and build shelter, but they’re still “paying his wages” aren’t they?

Gilligan's Island!

Crichton immediately realises that the party has little chance of survival unless he takes charge and helps them. After some initial indignation, the family are forced to fall in as they realise the real dangers of their new world. Thus society becomes inverted and Crichton becomes their lord and master.

 
Whether this Orwellian turn-about was in Barrie’s original play, I’m not aware, but it feels slightly at odds with the deference and respect he has otherwise shown the family: to suddenly start squad bashing and bullying them – even for their own good – seems like power has gone to his head.

Never-the-less, the new alpha male, finds himself the centre of attention as Tweeny and Mary compete for his affections… Lord Brockenhurst is a long way away…and up to no good anyway with a maid re-employed from Loam's household.

What's good for the goose etc...

Crichton has a fantasy which he now shares with Mary that he had been a Babylonian king in an earlier life and she had been a Christian slave. DeMille gladly takes us back to the brutality and opulence of this imagined time and even throws in some lions and a young Bebe Daniels for good measure.

Things don’t end well for the slave girl Mary and this is a guilt Crichton feels he still carries with him: now is his chance to put things right.

Swanson, Bebe Daniels and Meighan in Babylon

But, just as it seems that Mary and Crichton will become the island’s first couple wed in a Christian ceremony, a boat is sighted and his own expertly-constructed coastal fire alarm brings their rescuers to them…

Back in Blighty, will Mary stay true to Crichton once he is relegated to his old post and, more to the point, will he still feel it appropriate to marry this woman so clearly above his station.

The ending is not what you might expect but that’s maybe more down to the play than the film! I won’t give it away… it’s still an interesting premise.

Back to life...

In spite of DeMille’s sheer “obviousness” it’s difficult to entirely dislike his work at this early stage. Things were gentler than they ended up in later works and there is an interesting message in the work he chose to adapt even submerged beneath his populist embellishments.

It’s also worth mentioning Gloria Swanson who gives the kind of performance that made her one of *the* stars. Here at twenty I found it hard to reconcile her with Norma Desmond but you watch Teddy at the Throttle and her other earlier shorts of the post-war period and you start to understand her abilities. Maybe not as funny as Mabel or as energetic as Mary, she, never-the-less, brought her own unique sensibilities.

Her eyes were incredibly expressive and she was a demure clothes horse when she chose to be. She also has an intelligence that unpins her performance and a slightly quirky beauty which helped her to stand out. Was she well served by Mr DeMille? Certainly in this film she stars and her bravery in pushing on with the lion scene – in spite of his misgivings (reverse psychology?) – deserves respect.

Did it add much to the story? Probably not, but certainly did to the spectacle… no one ever lay down with a live lion!

Male and Female is available from  Amazon on its own as part of the Swanson box set. This also includes a number of her shorter comedies and excellent new scores all round.