Good Dame

This Paramount Picture, a tough girl/tough boy romance acted expertly by Fredrick March and Sylvia Sydney was made in 1934, the final year before the code came into effect. Typical of many a Pre-Code picture of the time, it is packed with sleazy unglamorous characters who go unpunished. Not much else to recommend it other than the occasional snappy dialogue, the chemistry between the two handsome leads, and some early Carnival scenes photogaphed by Leon Shamroy before his glossier Twentieth Century Fox days. March, usually the debonair leaving man is cast against type here, playing the sort of role that was to make Jimmy Cagney famous, and Sydney is lovely, vulnerable, and adorable. Once the Code was imposed, stories like this about the seamier side of life stopped being made. This minor film is a document then of how some people survived during Depression days. For that alone, it's worth watching.