Faithless (Harry Beaumont, 1932)

Robert Montgomery and Tallulah Bankhead in Faithless

Cast: Tallulah Bankhead, Robert Montgomery, Hugh Herbert, Maurice Murphy, Louise Closser Hale, Anna Appel, Lawrence Grant, Henry Kolker. Screenplay: Carey Wilson, based on a novel by Mildred Cram. Cinematography: Oliver T. Marsh. Art direction: Cedric Gibbons. Film editing: Hugh Wynn. Costume design: Adrian.

Faithless is a pretty good demonstration of why Tallulah Bankhead failed to become a major Hollywood star. It has a standard weepie plot: Rich girl loses her money in the Depression, becomes the mistress of a wealthy man, breaks with him when a former boyfriend discovers their relationship, reconciles with the boyfriend and marries him, but when he's injured in an accident finds that prostitution is the only way she can pay his medical bills; rescued from a life on the streets by a kindly cop, she confesses to her husband, who forgives her. The trouble is that Bankhead is not a sufferer; she's too tough and clever to play a role that should have gone to the likes of Janet Gaynor or Ruth Chatterton. The film is chiefly of interest as an example of what Hollywood could get away with before the Production Code. It's also interesting to see comic actor Hugh Herbert cast (wrongly) in a serious role as the man whose mistress Bankhead becomes.