Parole Girl (1933)

• Directed by Edward F. Cline.

• Screenplay by Norman Krasna, from his story “Dance of the Millions.”

• Mae Clarke is Sylvia Day, a down-on-her-luck young woman who – as a favor to her late father’s generous-yet-crooked schemer of a friend (Anthony “Tony” Grattan, played by Hale Hamilton) – plays the role of a “respectable woman” pickpocket to Tony’s pickpocketed accuser, in a twice-enacted plan o’ extortion.

(While in a department store, Tony yells that his wallet has been stolen and makes a show of definitively identifying Sylvia as the culprit. When Running Sylvia is (intentionally) snagged by store security and taken back-of-house to be reprimanded and/or searched, Tony then claims to find his wallet buried deep in one of his jacket pockets, leaving Store Officials to offer crying, embarrassed Sylvia Funds o’ Compensation for her unwilling involvement in the ordeal…which she and Tony then split.)

• The second time the pair attempts to pull off this scam (it’s Tony, by the way, who is greedily unsatisfied with doing it just the once, and debt-guilts Sylvia into having another go) – after Tony makes his exit, but before Sylvia receives her payout – the store is tipped off about the money-seeking fakery, and Sylvia is arrested – ultimately receiving a one-year prison sentence.

(It seems key to note that forgiving kind-heart of a store manager, Mr. Walsh (Sam Godfrey), is ready to let Sylvia the Obviously Remorseful off with a warning – but no-nonsense Store Insurance Representative Joe Smith (Ralph Bellamy) is like, ‘Hell to the no! Lady Extortion must pay for her crimes, because I am a life-ruining hardass, and those are the rules of Insurance World.’)

• After one (!) month in prison, Wronged-‘n’-Clever Sylvia finagles her way out via heroically fighting a workroom fire that she…*cough*…set herself – and upon receiving her freedom, she immediately commences her Plan o’ Vengeance against one Joe Smith, Insurance Man.

(Here it should be clarified that Mr. Smith and Sylvia never laid eyes on each other – all of Joe’s prosecutorial advice was delivered via telephone.)

• Joe Smith lives at 331 E. 56th Street, in Apartment 5-C. (I really hope that’s someone’s present-day NYC address, because that would be wild.) Sylvia finds him there, engages in a brief period of stalkery, and – after getting him blackout shitfaced one night – pretends that he drunkenly married her.

• So…I’ve gotta be honest – Sylvia’s Grand Revenge Plan makes very little sense to me. The morning after they’ve been “married” by “Justice of the Peace” Tony, Sylvia – with cold sincerity – reveals to Joe both her motives and her identity, and is like, ‘For the next calendar year, you will pretend to be my husband – because, yes, I know you already have an undivorced wife “out west” – and if you don’t play along with my scheming, vindictive whims, I will ruin you with bigamy allegations!’

Like…what? What kind of plan is this? I mean, in theory, I guess it makes logistical sense that she gets a year of room and board and forcedly positive parole reports from him – but why is this worthy of being the central plot-line of a movie? (It probably doesn’t help things that all of this develops so boringly and methodically; there’s no sparkle or thrill to the way any of the story’s details are communicated, and that, my friends, really blows.)

(I think I expected way more out of Norman Krasna.)

(Or…perhaps this is what it looks like when a Krasna screenplay is handled by a mismatched director. To be sure, Keystone Kop Cline was a well-respected comedian-collaborator – but I think we can all agree that he was no Fritz Lang (director of Krasna’s FURY (1936) story), Garson Kanin (director of Krasna’s BACHELOR MOTHER (1939) screenplay), or Alfred Hitchcock (director of Krasna’s MR. & MRS. SMITH (1941) story and screenplay).)

(Okay, okay – it feels irresponsible to not also note that this was only the third screenplay of Krasna’s career, following 1932’s HOLLYWOOD SPEAKS (now considered lost, but which was co-written by experienced talent Jo Swerling) and THAT’S MY BOY (which – based on the title alone – I’d imagine sucked way more than this one).)

• Anyway, Joe and Sylvia rather predictably fall in love with each other for real (a romance that is somewhat creepily, meddlingly encouraged by Joe’s way-too-comfortable boss Mr. Taylor (Ferdinand Gottschalk)(“No baby, no vice presidency!”)(eeeek)) – and when Wife #1, a prison pal of Sylvia’s named Jeanie (a solidly convincing Marie Prevost) appears on the scene, ready and eager to further blackmail Joe into oblivion – Chastened Sylvia decides she must abandon ship – taking Jeanie with her – to protect “Joe dear.”

• Is now a good time to mention that Joe’s apartment is adorned with several stylized paintings of eyeless women who otherwise look very much like Myrna Loy? Plot-wise, this means nothing – but they’re weird pieces of artwork to have hanging on one’s wall, so I feel compelled to comment on them.

• Sylvia finds out from Jeanie that – just kidding – Jeanie actually obtained a divorce from Joe a few years go, he just doesn’t know it yet…whereupon Sylvia hops off that train to Florida and skedaddles straight back to New York and the waiting arms of Joe the Warmly Receptive, who instantly proposes For-Real Marriage, hooray.

• There’s certainly not much to rave about here, though all of the lead performances were decent enough. Overall, a very unspectacular screenplay, shot with unspectacular cinematography…which really makes one wonder what magnificent things Mae Clarke might have achieved, had she more often been placed in movies where such things were not the case.