Hollywood Unbound: The Pre-Code Era, 1930-34

Film historian Thomas Doherty has characterized the films produced in the early "talkie" years, 1930-34, as "the raw stuff of American culture, unvarnished and unveiled." In this course we will explore the cinematic product of that era, by viewing representative films about gender identiy and sexual freedom, equality, and "inversion," political corruption, vice, crime, violence, racial and religious transgressions, and how those films reflect the social and cultural realities of Depression America. An understanding of how this period of creative innovation enhanced by sound aroused social and religious indignation leading to Joseph Breen's 1934 enforcement of the Production Code will emerge from our study.