Bad Sister | |
---|---|
Directed by | Hobart Henley |
Written by | Edwin H. Knopf Tom Reed Raymond L. Schrock Based on a novel by Booth Tarkington |
Produced by | Carl Laemmle, Jr. |
Starring | Conrad Nagel Sidney Fox Bette Davis ZaSu Pitts Humphrey Bogart |
Cinematography | Karl Freund |
Edited by | Ted J. Kent |
Music by | David Broekman |
Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 68 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Bad Sister is a 1931 American pre-Code drama film directed by Hobart Henley. The screenplay by Edwin H. Knopf, Tom Reed, and Raymond L. Schrock is based on the 1913 novel The Flirt by Booth Tarkington, which had been filmed in 1916 and 1922.
The film marks the screen debuts of both Bette Davis and Sidney Fox (who was billed over Davis). The cast also includes Humphrey Bogart and ZaSu Pitts in supporting roles. Bad Sister has been preserved in the Library of Congress collection. [1] [2]
Set in the 1930s, Marianne Madison, bored with her routine life, falls for dashing con artist Valentine Corliss, who has come to her small town looking for fresh marks to swindle. She has many suitors, including the desirable Dr. Lindley and the portly Mr. Trumbull. In a chance encounter, she meets Corliss when out on a date with Dr. Lindley, feigns to know Valentine, and leaves her date to head home with Valentine.
Corliss soon charms her into faking her well-respected father's name on a letter of endorsement, which he presents to a small group of local merchants, who willingly give him money. Corliss then prepares his escape, but not before conning Marianne to leave with him with the promise of marriage.
Her sister Laura is sweet and unassuming, and she is in love with Dr. Lindley, who does not return her affections. Her younger brother hands her personal diary to Dr. Lindley when he visits the house to look after her father, who has collapsed after being berated by Marianne for not supporting Valentine without verifying him. Dr. Lindley is flustered and excuses himself. Laura burns her diary and with it her hopes of marrying him.
Meanwhile, after spending a night together in his Columbus hotel room, Valentine abandons Marianne.
Angry, ashamed, no longer a maiden—and unmarried—she returns home and announces to her jilted fiancé Dr. Lindley that she will now marry him. However, she has toyed with him too much, and he informs her that he has fallen in love with her shy younger sister Laura and that he no longer returns her affections.
All is not lost; after confessing to her father and the duped investors, Marianne accepts wealthy but portly Wade Trumbull's marriage proposal. Trumbull bails her father completely out of his debt, and during their first year of marriage, Marianne comes to be genuinely fond of him.
Humphrey DeForest Bogart, colloquially nicknamed Bogie, was an American film and stage actor. His performances in classic Hollywood cinema films made him an American cultural icon. In 1999, the American Film Institute selected Bogart as the greatest male star of classic American cinema.
Dark Victory is a 1939 American melodrama film directed by Edmund Goulding, starring Bette Davis, and featuring George Brent, Humphrey Bogart, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Ronald Reagan, Henry Travers, and Cora Witherspoon. The screenplay by Casey Robinson was based on the 1934 play of the same title by George Brewer and Bertram Bloch, starring Tallulah Bankhead.
Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress with a career spanning more than 50 years and 100 acting credits. She was noted for playing unsympathetic, sardonic characters, and was famous for her performances in a range of film genres, from contemporary crime melodramas to historical films, suspense horror, and occasional comedies, although her greater successes were in romantic dramas. A recipient of two Academy Awards, she was the first thespian to accrue ten nominations.
Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid is a 1982 American neo-noir mystery comedy film directed, co-written by, and co-starring Carl Reiner and co-written by and starring Steve Martin. Co-starring Rachel Ward, the film is both a parody of and a homage to film noir and the pulp detective films of the 1940s. The title refers to Martin's character telling a story about a woman obsessed with plaid in a scene that was ultimately cut from the film.
The Petrified Forest is a 1936 American crime drama film directed by Archie Mayo and based on Robert E. Sherwood's 1934 drama of the same name. The motion picture stars Leslie Howard, Bette Davis and Humphrey Bogart. The screenplay was written by Delmer Daves and Charles Kenyon, and adaptations were later performed on radio and television. The film is set in Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona.
Marked Woman is a 1937 American dramatic crime film directed by Lloyd Bacon and starring Bette Davis and Humphrey Bogart, with featured performances by Lola Lane, Isabel Jewell, Rosalind Marquis, Mayo Methot, Jane Bryan, Eduardo Ciannelli and Allen Jenkins. Set in the underworld of Manhattan, Marked Woman tells the story of a woman who dares to stand up to one of the city's most powerful gangsters.
Humphrey Bogart (1899–1957) was an American actor and producer whose 36-year career began with live stage productions in New York in 1920. He had been born into an affluent family in New York's Upper West Side, the first-born child and only son of illustrator Maud Humphrey and physician Belmont Deforest Bogart. The family eventually came to include his sisters Patricia and Catherine. His parents believed he would excel academically, possibly matriculate at Yale University and become a surgeon. They enrolled him in the private schools of Delancey, Trinity, and Phillips Academy, but Bogart was not inclined as a scholar and never completed his studies at Phillips, joining the United States Navy in 1918.
Three on a Match is a 1932 American pre-Code crime drama released by Warner Bros. The film was directed by Mervyn LeRoy and stars Joan Blondell, Warren William, Ann Dvorak and Bette Davis. The film also features Lyle Talbot, Humphrey Bogart, Allen Jenkins and Edward Arnold.
They Drive by Night is a 1940 American film noir directed by Raoul Walsh and starring George Raft, Ann Sheridan, Ida Lupino, and Humphrey Bogart, and featuring Gale Page, Alan Hale, Roscoe Karns, John Litel and George Tobias. The picture involves a pair of embattled truck drivers and was released in the UK under the title The Road to Frisco. The film was based on A. I. Bezzerides' 1938 novel Long Haul, which was later reprinted under the title They Drive by Night to capitalize on the success of the film.
Conflict is a 1945 American black-and-white suspense film noir made by Warner Brothers. It was directed by Curtis Bernhardt, produced by William Jacobs from a screenplay by Arthur T. Horman and Dwight Taylor, based on the story The Pentacle by Alfred Neumann and Robert Siodmak. It starred Humphrey Bogart, Alexis Smith, and Sydney Greenstreet. The film is the only pairing of Bogart and Greenstreet of the five in which they acted together where Bogart rather than Greenstreet is the villain or corrupt character. There is also a cameo appearance of the Maltese Falcon statue.
The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse is a 1938 American crime film directed by Anatole Litvak and starring Edward G. Robinson, Claire Trevor and Humphrey Bogart. It was distributed by Warner Bros. and written by John Wexley and John Huston, based on the 1936 play The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse, the first play written by short-story writer Barré Lyndon, which ran for three months on Broadway with Cedric Hardwicke after playing in London.
Shining Victory is a 1941 American drama film based on the 1940 play Jupiter Laughs, by A. J. Cronin. It stars James Stephenson, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Donald Crisp, and Barbara O'Neil. It is the first film directed by Irving Rapper. Bette Davis makes a brief cameo appearance as a nurse.
The Two Mrs. Carrolls is a 1947 American mystery film noir directed by Peter Godfrey and starring Humphrey Bogart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Alexis Smith. It was produced by Mark Hellinger from a screenplay by Thomas Job, based on the 1935 play by Martin Vale.
Deception is a 1946 American film noir drama released by Warner Brothers and directed by Irving Rapper. The film is based on the 1927 play Monsieur Lamberthier by Louis Verneuil. The screenplay was written by John Collier and Joseph Than. It stars Bette Davis, Paul Henreid, and Claude Rains, who had also appeared together in the highly successful Now, Voyager (1942).
Kid Galahad is a 1937 boxing film starring Edward G. Robinson, Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart and, in the title role, rising newcomer Wayne Morris. It was scripted by Seton I. Miller and directed by Michael Curtiz.
God's Gift to Women is a 1931 American pre-Code romantic musical comedy film directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Frank Fay, Laura LaPlante, and Joan Blondell. The film, based on the play The Devil Was Sick by Jane Hinton, was originally completed as a musical film; however, because of audience dislike for musicals at that time, all the songs were cut in American prints. The full film was released intact in other countries, where there was no such decline in popularity.
The Sisters is a 1938 American drama film produced and directed by Anatole Litvak and starring Errol Flynn and Bette Davis. The screenplay by Milton Krims is based on the 1937 novel of the same title by Myron Brinig.
20,000 Years in Sing Sing is a 1932 American pre-Code drama film set in Sing Sing Penitentiary, the maximum security prison in Ossining, New York, starring Spencer Tracy as an inmate and Bette Davis as his girlfriend. It was directed by Michael Curtiz and based upon the nonfiction book Twenty Thousand Years in Sing Sing, written by Lewis E. Lawes, the warden of Sing Sing from 1920 to 1941.
Two Against the World, also known as One Fatal Hour, is a 1936 American melodrama film directed by William C. McGann and starring Humphrey Bogart, Beverly Roberts and Linda Perry. The film is based on the 1930 play Five Star Final by Louis Weitzenkorn and is a much shorter remake of the film Five Star Final, which stars Edward G. Robinson. The main setting has been moved from a newspaper to a nationwide radio network whose owner, Bertram Reynolds, hungry for larger audiences, decides "in the name of public good" to revive the memory of a twenty-year-old murder case, with tragic consequences. The cynical manager of programming, Sherry Scott, has a crisis of conscience when faced with the deadly results.
The Flirt is a 1922 American silent comedy film directed by Hobart Henley. The cast included George Nichols, Lloyd Whitlock, Lydia Knott, William Welsh, Helen Jerome Eddy, Bert Roach, Eileen Percy, Edward Hearn, Harold Goodwin, and Buddy Messinger. It was based on Tarkington's 1913 novel The Flirt. It was a Carl Laemmle film produced by Universal Film Manufacturing Company. The story features a girl who insist on having things her way. A film edition of the book was published in 1922 with film stills. Sheet music for a theme song, "The Flirt; Whose Heart Are You Breaking To-Night" was also released in 1922.