The box office check-up of 1935 (1936)

WHY WOMEN CO TO "THE MOVIES" C) Well, why? Is it for romance? Or is it for fashions? Nope, it's simply for — by LLEWELLYN MILLER LAST year the greatest jail-break of all history was staged, quietly, efficiently and without bannerlines from one single newspaper. To this day, the number of those who slipped from prison is not known exactly, but the total is in staggering millions. Women go to movies for escape — escape from the housewife’s thankless routine, escape from the blighting standardization of office and factory, escape from boredom and self-criticism and the little walls of home. Young women, hounded by dim forebodings that life is not going to be undiluted beer and winning skittles, seek reassurance that everything always comes out right. Old women, with innocent romance shining unquenchable in dimming eyes, slide their bits of silver into the box office as an investment in freedom from the relentless onrush of time. Little girls escape the embarrassment of being considered something less than creatures of fatal charm and beauty by their stripling suitors in regarding, round-eyed and hopeful, the eventual subjugation of the hero by the eternally triumphant heroine. The converted store room, hot and muggy in the prairie night, is no less a sanctuary than the gilded cavern breezy with perfumed antiseptic air and sound-proofed against the roar of a great city. Both are refugees from the prison of self-concentration. Both are temporary safety zones in the traffic of humdrum events. Both are temples, dedicated to worship of the happy ending. When it comes to plot development, delineation of life, and portrayals of human impulses on the screen, producers are bum psychologists. But when it comes to giving audiences what they want, producers are brilliant in their understanding of the feminine desire for the fairy book finale "and they lived happily ever after." Every woman, whether she will admit it or not, has a deep, instinctive conviction that the ultimate clinch which terminates films with practically unvarying regularity, is fitting and proper. The implied achievement of a lifetime of worship, devotion and, if possible a little awe, from the hero to the heroine seems to her nice work on the part of the lady. And not only good going by the heroine, but fair dealing on the part of fate. The most serene mama of a large family, the most comradely of wives, the most rational of career-women, the most placid of grandmothers, the most contented of practical, cool-tempered and unsentimental women have moments when emotional horizons seem oppressively inelastic. Not one of these women would consider for one moment any basic change. Their loyalties to their men are irrevocably engaged and honorably unwavering. But romance gets a bit bogged down in routine. An hour's contemplation of a shadow heroine's sorrows and sufferings and eventual bliss is release from personal problems, a sublimation of vague rebellion against nothingever-happening, a soothing of the unformulated disappointment that Prince Ch arming turned out to be just a devoted father and a good provider. In that feminine wistfulness for romance lies the immense appeal for women of such films as "Mutiny on the Bounty." Question almost any man, and he will label that film a "man's picture." His classification will be given with just the slightest patronizing overtone of implication that women shy away from realities that are brutal and conflicts that are elemental unless they deal with love in politely evasive symbols. They forget that most women identify themselves with their men in some degree, and that the upright fellow winning against horrific odds does not have to draft feminine support. The tale of perils he has run guarantees quick volunteers to share vicariously his injustices, approve his righteous revolt, to ally themselves with him against the blind villainy of unpredictable circumstance. In that same feminine wistfulness for romantic strength of purpose against all obstacles, lies the indifference of most women to roistering comedies. Undeniably, there are plenty of soprano chuckles at the exploits of our more prominent buffoons, but always in that feminine laughter there is a percentage of amusement at the unconfined joy of the men in the audience. Comedies, to women, are somewhat akin to the strenuous efforts of children in a game of let's-pretend. They regard the giddy gambollings of the Marx Brothers in "A Night at the Opera" with kindly detachment. That they may not seem lacking in wit, women encourage themselves to hearty laughter when their sons and husbands and brothers are rolling in the aisles. Once in a long time, women extract quite a large measure of entertainment from communion with the slapstick muse. But the grim fact remains that at some time during the unreeling, the average woman will turn a glance of mild wonder upon her hysterical escort and smile in secret and mature tenderness. Comedies of sound dramatic verity are another matter. Women are well trained to appreciate the comic quality of mischance. Such humor adds immensely to the appeal of romance. Individually, many films offer many different bids for matinee patronage. More than one picture has gladdened exhibitors' hearts for no better reason than that the star hopped in and out of forty gowns while getting her man. There is a merry tinkle of silver under the marquee glittering with the magic name of Shirley Temple, because the theme that the touch of baby fingers can completely change characters of crabbed millionaires is apparently of deathless breathless allure. But basically, the reason that women go to movies is to escape for a little steadying hour the harrassing experience of living in a world where virtue quite frequently is rewarded with a kick in the pants, where some notably inferior blonde often scoops up your man, where true love gets the blind staggers for almost any old excuse, and where few women can manage to get fifty percent of the close-ups. THE BOX OFFICE CHECK-UP OF 1935