The film starts at the end. Mary Martin (Loretta Young) is on trial for murder. She seems resigned to her fate, browsing through a magazine during final arguments. When the jury goes out the clerk of the court offers to let her wait out the jury in his office. He's a kind gentle old fellow and mentions he has done this job for almost 38 years. Mary starts looking at the covers of the record books on the shelves and remembering how she had gotten to the place she was - sitting in a chair waiting to see if she is going to get "The" chair. What follows is a flashback of a girl who had very bad luck and a bad companion - Bunny (Una Merkel)who, when she tries to steal some jewelry, lets Mary take the rap even though Mary knew nothing about it. Mary gets three years in juvenile hall, and when she gets out at 16, she and Bunny get mixed up with Leo (Ricardo Cortez) and company, a couple of racketeers.
Mary gets away from them for awhile and tries to find a decent job, but the doors are all shut for her. Now this had me puzzled. The movie was made in 1933, but this is supposed to be the 1920's when times were good. I guess WB thought audiences could relate to Mary better if she was having a bad economic time of it like everybody else in 1933. Wellman uses his silent movie techniques to sum up the despair of job-hunters in the Great Depression via a succession of large neon billboards, where the wording constantly changes from the name of the product being advertised and each sign instead proclaims "No help wanted" or "No jobs today".
At any rate, starving, she goes back to the gang and to Leo, only to part with them again when a speak easy robbery goes bad and a cop is shot.
She is rescued from the scene by wealthy Tom (Franchot Tone). He helps her get a decent job by underwriting her secretarial school and then putting her to work in his law firm. Tom never knew about the robbery and the shot cop, and then one day Mary's past catches up to her unexpectedly and she has to make Tom believe she never cared about him because she does not want him mixed up in a scandal. When she gets out of jail she goes back to Leo, still staying away from Tom to keep him out of trouble. Where this goes and who she kills and why she kills I'll leave for you to watch and find out.
And this is where we came in. Mary halfway acts like she would like to get the death sentence. If you want to see what does happen - and it is a real Hollywood style ending, then watch and see. Actually, I thought Ricardo Cortez was better than Loretta Young here. He has this smooth exterior but you just keep waiting for him to boil over into pure anger at any given moment. Loretta Young did a good job, but her role didn't give her a chance to surprise you with her range or anything like that. Franchot sprinkles his nice guy persona with plenty humor, and the whole cast sprinkles the entire production with frank talk of sex that you won't see after the code.
Mary gets away from them for awhile and tries to find a decent job, but the doors are all shut for her. Now this had me puzzled. The movie was made in 1933, but this is supposed to be the 1920's when times were good. I guess WB thought audiences could relate to Mary better if she was having a bad economic time of it like everybody else in 1933. Wellman uses his silent movie techniques to sum up the despair of job-hunters in the Great Depression via a succession of large neon billboards, where the wording constantly changes from the name of the product being advertised and each sign instead proclaims "No help wanted" or "No jobs today".
At any rate, starving, she goes back to the gang and to Leo, only to part with them again when a speak easy robbery goes bad and a cop is shot.
She is rescued from the scene by wealthy Tom (Franchot Tone). He helps her get a decent job by underwriting her secretarial school and then putting her to work in his law firm. Tom never knew about the robbery and the shot cop, and then one day Mary's past catches up to her unexpectedly and she has to make Tom believe she never cared about him because she does not want him mixed up in a scandal. When she gets out of jail she goes back to Leo, still staying away from Tom to keep him out of trouble. Where this goes and who she kills and why she kills I'll leave for you to watch and find out.
And this is where we came in. Mary halfway acts like she would like to get the death sentence. If you want to see what does happen - and it is a real Hollywood style ending, then watch and see. Actually, I thought Ricardo Cortez was better than Loretta Young here. He has this smooth exterior but you just keep waiting for him to boil over into pure anger at any given moment. Loretta Young did a good job, but her role didn't give her a chance to surprise you with her range or anything like that. Franchot sprinkles his nice guy persona with plenty humor, and the whole cast sprinkles the entire production with frank talk of sex that you won't see after the code.