Safety in Numbers

Of interest today almost exclusively due to the appearance of Carole Lombard in one of her first films at Paramount, SAFETY IN NUMBERS is one of those mediocre musical programmers from the early talkie screen that almost killed the movie musical genre. Buddy Rogers (Mary Pickford's future husband) stars as a young heir who has been raised by his uncle since his parents' deaths. Now twenty, his uncle decides the boy needs to experience the world a bit more since he's on the eve of receiving his parents' millions. Uncle Richard Tucker particularly wants him to be wary of golddiggers, so he sends him to New York to be looked after by, all of people, three showgirls, mistress types he trusts (how he knows them is never quite explained!) to keep predatory floozies away from him and help him find a nice girl (with payment for their assistance, of course). These chicks are scarcely older but hardened types but they quickly became enamored of the sweet young man themselves, so unlike the sleazy middle-aged men who pay their rent and give them expensive gifts (these broads are initially p.o.'d that the young heir has given them jewelry valued at "only $2,000" but are touched when they learn that's all the money he has with him.) Brunette Kathryn Crawford particularly likes him and he her, but when he meets a lovely young innocent telephone operator (Virginia Bruce) they all are upset. Crawford in particular has a conscious via her crush, with her long history with sugar daddies she's knows she's not good enough for him.

This is the first time I ever saw Buddy Rogers carry a picture. He was fairly popular at the time in such musicals although his quivering voice is not particularly good. He's kind of a cuter Arthur Lake or unsassy William Haines; he's passable as a lead but definitely not major star material.

This is a very typical early Paramount talkie; the camera is often so far back it's like you're watching a filmed play. The print I viewed was very good but the sound was not; I don't think this was an issue with an aged print as the sound was not static or muffled, it's just hard to hear some of the lines suggesting the mikes were too far away from the actors. Director Victor Schwertzinger later made such excellent films as "The Fleet's In", "One Night of Love" and the first two Hope-Crosby-Lamour Road movies but he doesn't show much promise in the way he handles this picture but then the script is bad and he's got a musical on his hands where nobody can really sing! Actually, somebody can, black character actress Louise Beavers who has a very good voice and gets to sing part of a song perhaps because her costars are not adept.

This is also a typical early Paramount talkie in that it features quite obscure players opposite the leading man (or leading women, in other films), actors who never really went anywhere and quickly disappeared from the screen, the case here being Kathryn Crawford and Josephine Dunn. Carole Lombard has the smallest role of the female trio but she gets the few laugh lines so ultimately has the best role. All three are coated with heavy makeup making them looking like Sadie Thompsons of New York. Complete with gaudy earrings and presumably unintentionally ugly gowns. Lombard's beauty is buried underneath all this, making Virginia Bruce in a small role stand out. Indeed, despite the size of her role, Bruce was often pictured in publicity shots with the four leads perhaps because her loveliness warranted it.

The songs are fairly bad (the movie opens most unpromisingly with a bad number that mercifully is not completed) but two are pretty good, particularly "My Future Just Passed". Lombard's talents alas did not include singing, and she has to talk her way through a terrible number that at east has a very racy line "You're the key to my ignition" (the movie also has a fairly audacious song "I'd Like to Be a Bee in Your Boudoir" that wouldn't have been used post-code). "My Future Just Passed" must have been something as a hit as it is one of the most common pieces of vintage movie sheet music of the day to be found now. Not remotely a good movie but it's nice to know it still exists.

A handful of films from 1929/1930 are great. The rest are either a) ok and still entertaining today or b) like something made by people who didn't know how to make movies: the reason for which is pretty obvious. This falls into that latter category.

As the talkies took hold, stage actors often said that movie actors l, trained for the silent cinema weren't proper actors - they had probably seen this! Stage actors however were often atrocious screen performers so they couldn't really talk ... but maybe they could regarding this.

It's not just the acting that's awful, the whole thing shouts out that nobody had a clue what they were doing - very surprising that this is a a Paramount production. That very same studio, Paramount, made THE DEVIL'S HOLIDAY about the same time and that, unlike this is a pretty decent film; beautifully shot and with actors acting.....made, just to disprove the theory of the theatre folk, by established silent director Edmund Goulding and starring established silent star Nancy Carroll. Being old therefore is no excuse for being bad. If you look at it in the context of what else Paramount released a this same time you half wonder whether it was something experimental that had been left on the shelf since 1927 that had been forgotten about.

What (little) appeal this has it that it's SO 1920s - the story, the songs, the dresses, the attitudes, the cars are so wonderfully different from what you find in 1930s films when the Depression has taken hold. When this was made, the Depression was just something for 'other people' to worry about. Life was rosy and this gives us a glimpse into another world on the very verge of extinction.

The acting style isn't what you'd call acting: several people carefully reading their lines in turn would describe it more accurately. The story is just padding for the songs....and the songs are not your jaunty 30s standards but forgettable 20s faux-jazz nonsense. For those of us used to 1930s musicals, the casting of this 'previous generation' picture also seems odd. I'm not referring to super clean-cut, "nice young man" Buddy Rogers but to the three cardboard gold-diggers. Don't think "1933" - although there's the inevitable negligee scenes, these three aren't remotely like actual characters so there's no sexual chemistry between them and the watcher, which the later pictures so perfectly achieved. That's another huge problem - there's absolutely no attempt whatsoever to make any of the characters believable at all.

Compared with say THE BROADWAY MELODY, which had a proper story, real characters and actual acting, this is inexplicably awful.

"Safety In Numbers" makes you wonder if Buddy Rogers' career would have gained more momentum had it been filmed in, say, 1934-5, after the clunkiness of early sound-on-film technology had been ironed out. This was clearly meant to be a showcase for Rogers, and he certainly makes the most of his musical opportunities, singing in every number except "You Appeal To Me." Come to think of it, NOBODY sings "You Appeal To Me," because Carole Lombard could not sing, choosing instead to speak the lyrics over the orchestral accompaniment. But Rogers zips through his songs, even playing the drums and piano at one point, not to mention a wicked trombone solo during "The Pick-Up." The only problem seems to be whether or not Rogers is meant to be a libertine or a sweet guy - clearly his uncle imagines him to be a jazz-and-sex crazed rogue, but Rogers' sweet pan and wholesome, charming personality suggest nothing more decadent than a high school football captain slightly intoxicated on grandma's elderberry wine.

Regardless, the film is a risqué romp through an early Depression garden of opportunities to see young women in their underthings for extended periods of time (Rogers ingenuously asks one of the girls what a bra is - she answers: "A ping-pong net." He deadpans: "I love ping-pong.") It's difficult to tell Carole Lombard and Josephine Dunn apart in long shot, but up close (and when they opens their mouths), it's clear that Lombard had an edge on Dunn in terms of comedy and timing. Both Dunn and Crawford were forgotten by the mid-thirties; the former's blandness and the latter's staginess probably did nothing to contribute to their longevity.

Credit goes to George Marion Jr.'s lyrics - he is one of the more obscure Tin Pan Alley lyricists, but I always find his words snappy, literate, and loaded with internal rhymes and fresh ideas (ridiculous as "A Bee in Your Boudoir" might be, it's a clever song that sticks in your head).

If you can find the film, give it a whirl, for the sake of Buddy Rogers, a half dozen great songs, and a look at the "naughty" musical cinema of the Depression before the Code crackdown in mid-1934.

This Paramount musical from 1930 boasted the currently hot Buddy Rogers when he emerged from the silents as a musical star (PARAMOUNT ON PARADE, FOLLOW THRU). This is a sideways version of the GOLD DIGGERS films with a trio of chorus girls on the loose and on the take (they live in a swanky apartment). But the catch here is that the rich and naive (think Dick Powell) Rogers is sent to live with them, with them as chaperons! Each girl is paid $10,000 to chaperon Rogers until he turns 21 and inherits $25 million.

Most of the song here are OK but nothing special. But "The Pick Up" is terrific as it swings through the intro, a trombone solo by Rogers, and an astonishing bit by Louise Beavers (as the maid Messalina). I never heard her sing before. The song ends with a chorus line of silhouettes dancing in front of a spinning New York skyline. An amazing number.

The chorines are played by Kathryn Crawford (who sings), Josephine Dunn (an MGM starlet loaned out to Paramount), and Carole Lombard (of all people). Others in the cast include Richard Tucker as the uncle, Virginia Bruce as Alma, and Roscoe Karns as the cab driver.

Rogers has a pleasing singing voice but his acting is very shaky (yet he is likable). Crawford looks rather dumpy. Lombard has the best line readings and you can see her future great performances in this early talkie.

First of all I was pleased with the large amount of screen time that Carole Lombard had in the film. I would say she gets the best lines of the three girls and the best dresses. Her delivery was also not as stilted as in many other of her early films. Perhaps the quick pace and light atmosphere of the film kept the dialogue more natural. All three girls sing a song to our leading man in an attempt to win his love, but sadly Miss Lombard only talk-sings her song. I thought many of the songs were enjoyable, although none of them were up to the standards of Lombard's other musical "We're Not Dressing". I was impressed, however, by the special effect of the silhouetted dancers dancing over a montage of New York at one point during the feature number. This film did have a heart, but it would have been so much better if we had been able to see any real development of the relationship between Buddy Rogers and the girl he chooses. As it was I can't say there was any reason to chose her over the others. He said he loved her; but why?