"Five and Ten" is a pre-code early talkie vehicle for Marion Davies, who plays the daughter of a nouveau-riche family threatened by Fifth-Avenue high society. Her father owns a chain of five-and-dime stores (hence the title), the success of which leads him to uproot his family from Kansas City to New York. In the big bad city, the father focuses on business and neglects his family, the mother begins an affair, the son starts panicking and drinking, and the daughter chases after a man engaged to be married to another woman. And, the servants must listen to these rich people complaining. More money, more problems, huh.
Actually, it's a fairly light and entertaining picture at first, with Marion Davies flirting with the engaged man (played by Leslie Howard), who Davies pushes into doing some actual work. He's an aspiring architect, see, but he spends his time as a playboy instead, cheating on his fiancée. She draws herself as a cow, and she tries to make a gentleman out of him, who draws himself as a pig; or, as Howard's character puts it, she's a "cheap rich girl," and he's a "misunderstood man." Davies and Howard have chemistry in the beginning--before the film's later melodramatics ruin the fun.
"Five and Ten" would've been better as a screwball-type comedy, expanding on a film that already has a scene where Davies is spanked by her brother and another where Howard threatens to repeat the act, or where Davies employs her sexual wiles to manipulate Howard into working and breaking off his engagement. Other pre-code Hollywood products, after all, are more sensational and entertaining in exploiting such topics of divorce and infidelity. "Five and Ten," however, probably wouldn't have needed to be rewritten much if made in the Breen Era, and the film takes a nose-dive by the end into the melodramatic and clichés about the dangers of wealth, sex and big cities--you know, things that in reality are great.
It's eye-rolling stuff: adult children thrown into hysterics because their parents might be separating, Midwestern values threatened by big business and high-society scandal, Howard's would-be wife conveniently turning out to be the bad girl, and contrivances upon deus ex machina. "Five and Ten" also suffers from the usual problems of early talkies. It's creaky, requiring actors to enunciate and shout their lines lest they be inaudible. Action is largely confined to sound-stage interiors, with exteriors mostly serving as transitions. There's some dolly shots, tilting, panning and even a crane shot, but, for the most part, it doesn't relieve the staginess being enhanced by the slow pacing. With an average shot length of about 12.9 seconds (my count), "Five and Ten" isn't especially tardy for an early talkie, but it's too lethargic giving the film's settings and subject matter, and its heavy use of dissolves and fades doesn't help. The sparsity of shot/reverse shots is also felt in a film with so much talking. The two rear-projection shots and the obviously fake cityscape backgrounds used in two scenes are forgivable by comparison in this forgettable melodrama.
Actually, it's a fairly light and entertaining picture at first, with Marion Davies flirting with the engaged man (played by Leslie Howard), who Davies pushes into doing some actual work. He's an aspiring architect, see, but he spends his time as a playboy instead, cheating on his fiancée. She draws herself as a cow, and she tries to make a gentleman out of him, who draws himself as a pig; or, as Howard's character puts it, she's a "cheap rich girl," and he's a "misunderstood man." Davies and Howard have chemistry in the beginning--before the film's later melodramatics ruin the fun.
"Five and Ten" would've been better as a screwball-type comedy, expanding on a film that already has a scene where Davies is spanked by her brother and another where Howard threatens to repeat the act, or where Davies employs her sexual wiles to manipulate Howard into working and breaking off his engagement. Other pre-code Hollywood products, after all, are more sensational and entertaining in exploiting such topics of divorce and infidelity. "Five and Ten," however, probably wouldn't have needed to be rewritten much if made in the Breen Era, and the film takes a nose-dive by the end into the melodramatic and clichés about the dangers of wealth, sex and big cities--you know, things that in reality are great.
It's eye-rolling stuff: adult children thrown into hysterics because their parents might be separating, Midwestern values threatened by big business and high-society scandal, Howard's would-be wife conveniently turning out to be the bad girl, and contrivances upon deus ex machina. "Five and Ten" also suffers from the usual problems of early talkies. It's creaky, requiring actors to enunciate and shout their lines lest they be inaudible. Action is largely confined to sound-stage interiors, with exteriors mostly serving as transitions. There's some dolly shots, tilting, panning and even a crane shot, but, for the most part, it doesn't relieve the staginess being enhanced by the slow pacing. With an average shot length of about 12.9 seconds (my count), "Five and Ten" isn't especially tardy for an early talkie, but it's too lethargic giving the film's settings and subject matter, and its heavy use of dissolves and fades doesn't help. The sparsity of shot/reverse shots is also felt in a film with so much talking. The two rear-projection shots and the obviously fake cityscape backgrounds used in two scenes are forgivable by comparison in this forgettable melodrama.