THE DIVORCEE (1930) is one of those pre-code Hollywood movies which are trumpeted in the recent TCM box sets called FORBIDDEN HOLLYWOOD; those films made in the few years between the coming of sound films and the strict clampdown of the production code movie censors. Being such a film means that it features a lot of naughty stuff the bluenoses thought would bring the country to wrack and ruin! Besides that, THE DIVORCEE is also the film in which "Queen of the Lot" Norma Shearer won an Oscar for Best Actress. The film itself therefore is of great historical interest; however it is also quite watchable as long as one has a generous spirit. By that I mean, being from 1930s THE DIVORCEE occasionally sports the very outdated acting styles which can make modern audiences giggle with embarrassment. Also the style of screenwriting (full of rapidly-delivered portentous speeches which build to a crescendo) so prevalent in the 1930's does now and then appear. A generous spirit while watching will however be rewarding since the film alternates such "dated" scenes with many scenes which are quite effective and emotional.

THE DIVORCEE takes as it's taboo subject marital infidelity. Jerry and Ted (Norma Shearer and Chester Morris respectively) reach their third wedding anniversary in blissful happiness. . .until it is revealed that Ted has had an affair in the recent past. The "other woman", you see, has tagged along with a group of wellwishing friends to the couple's apartment and Ted's reaction gives his little secret away. "It doesn't mean anything" is Ted's constant mantra to Jerry; but Jerry is understandable crushed. Ted unfortunately has to go out of town on a business trip on the very night of their anniversary; leaving Jerry to stew while accompanied out on the town by Ted's not-so-best friend Don (Robert Montgomery). And yes, since infidelity "doesn't mean anything" according to Ted, the still hurting Jerry has sex with Don. After a week, Ted returns and Jerry informs him she herself has also had an affair. In a beautiful piece of screenwriting, Jerry tells him that she has "balanced their accounts". Ted, by his angry and hurt reaction, proves that it DOES matter after all. Angered, bewildered and hurt some more, Jerry rails against this obvious double standard "his affair means nothing while hers is a betrayal) and Jerry lets him have it. She decides that she's been missing out on what all these "loose" women knew all along. She's going to have some fun! In another great line, she tells Ted that her doors are open to all men. . .EXCEPT him! The marriage quickly breaks up and the pair get divorced. Jerry decides that her newfound freedom gives her the license to go after all the men she wants. But of course, the pair are still in love with each other despite their newfound hatred towards one another. Will they eventually get back together or has Jerry embarked on a path of no return. Most Hollywood films . . . you'd already know the answer. But this is a PRE-CODE Hollywood film and nothing can be taken for granted as the outcome is by no means sure.

I found myself enjoying this film much more than I thought I would. (I admit to buying the FORBIDDEN HOLLYWOOD VOL. 2 box set for another movie on it). I was frankly expecting some rather heavy going. I expected it to be a typical Hollywood weepy that was incredibly stilted and creaky. I expected something stagey with old-fashioned overly-theatrical acting featuring people grouped around a big bowl of flowers with the microphone concealed inside of it. I was quite surprised, therefore, to find some camera mobility as well as the willingness to NOT have the film consist of wall-to-wall dialogue (as is the case in most early talkies). In fact, the scene where Jerry contemplates and then has her affair with Tom is played in a series of shots with NO DIALOGUE WHATSOEVER; a very ballsy move for a film of that time period when Hollywood thought they had to have sound sound SOUND in order to distance themselves from the now oh-so-passe silent movie days. We see a grim Jerry and a frivolous Don out on the town in a nightclub (jazz age big band blaring), a seen of the two in the backseat of a taxi and finally cut to outside an apartment window as the curtains close. We need no dialogue to tell us exactly what's going on here. The next scene opens back in Jerry's apartment as the still-clad-in-evening-dress Jerry enters, looks down and softly kicks the MORNING paper lying in the entranceway. The morning paper! If we didn't know what she's done before now, we certainly can't feign ignorance any longer! A nice job by director Robert Z. Leonard; a director I'm only familiar with from his film noir THE BRIBE.

The cast is also top notch. While they do occasionally fall prey to that old-fashioned style of acting I talked about before, they mostly acquit themselves rather well. Screen siren Norma Shearer (Mrs. Irving Thalberg herself) justified her star status (ESPECIALLY after winning the Oscar) here departed from her usual "good girl" image by being the first to really make it OK to be an on-screen non-virgin who ISN'T married! I'm not familiar with the other actresses nominated that year but Shearer probably deserved it. In more scenes than not, Shearer is quite good. Her hurt coupled with interior seething anger really comes across in the scene where Ted reveals his "double standard" thinking about their affairs. She is also remarkable in the kitchen scene right before she tells the just-returned Ted about her affair; Shearer constantly avoids kissing him by placing objects (a tray, a vase, a coffee pot) between them as she restlessly richochets around the kitchen. This is, I think, the first time I've ever actually SEEN Norma Shearer in a movie and I think she deserves her "movie star" status. She is definitely incandescent on screen and her beauty is indeed extremely fragile; she had to be photographed exactly in the right way in order for the camera to "love" her. Shearer can literally look ravishing one moment and plain or odd the next. But she certainly had that indefinable "star quality". As for Chester Morris, he is slightly less successful but still very good. One of the few he-men who made a go of it in the talkies (his voice matched his appearance), Morris doesn't quite match up to Shearer in their confrontation scene but elsewhere in the film he is effective as the macho knucklehead who destroys his own happy marriage.

Shearer and Morris actually have a lot of onscreen sexual chemistry together and one can, with not too much imagination, picture them both setting their bedroom on fire. Poor Conrad Nagel, who features in a parallel storyline which I won't go into here, went from major leading man in the silent days to second banana here (or actually THIRD banana). However, his scenes and storyline are also very nicely done and he can certainly deliver a stage punch better than Morris. Here, oddly enough, we see Nagel actually presenting Shearer's Best Actress Oscar to his co-star.

As the slightly slimy and craven good time boy Don, Robert Montgomery is also excellent. Montgomery plays the part exactly how it should be played; affable with his friend Ted, opportunistically bedding Ted's wife at the first opportunity, pleading on the phone with Jerry NOT to tell Ted about it and, when she says she's going to, quickly hops the first boat out of town. All champagne and self-interest, Montgomery is perfect.

One caveat concerning the FORBIDDEN HOLLYWOOD dvd, however. It is disconcerting that the commentary track, while interesting and lively, lags behind the onscreen action. In other words, it isn't synced properly with the film so the commentators often are discussing scenes that have already passed by. Also, after "The End" appears on the screen it goes to black. However, there is exit music playing under this black screen. Unfortunately, the DVD manufacturer cuts off the film before the music has ended. A very minor complaint, to be sure, but a little too sloppy for the price of a dvd box set. Hopefully more care is taken with the rest of the film in the set.

So, would I recommend THE DIVORCEE??? Actually, yes I would. As long as you watch with a forgiving nature and let the occasional antiqueness of the film roll off your back, you should find THE DIVORCEE and pleasingly frank and actually quite sexy example of movies before the production code made even married couple sleep in separate beds with one foot always on the floor.