Coquette (1929)
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Coquette Movie Review
Coquette is a 1929 melodrama starring Mary Pickford and directed by Sam Taylor. It is a very problematic, backwards movie.
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“You’re most adorable“
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The story follows a young Southern girl who falls in love with a man of whom her father is not supportive. Eventually the father kills him and the action moves to court. This plot is just ridiculously melodramatic and sappy. I like these older melodramas, but this one is too much even for me.
The film is just ridiculously harsh in its treatment of poor Norma Besant. It was totally unnecessary to at first kill off her boyfriend and then her father. Thus the film felt needlessly sadistic and I stress the word needlessly because the ending is not rewarding and she did not learn anything nor did this movie present any message whatsoever to go along with all that violence.
Coquette did not age well at all. I will later talk about the technicalities as that is less important for me, but in terms of storytelling, characterization and attitudes, it aged miserably. The film’s treatment of women is so bad and I never got the impression that the film sympathized with Norma or that the filmmakers judged her father’s terrible actions. Then again maybe the filmmakers did think that, but the film is so simplistic and straightforward in its execution that it just tells its story without ever resorting to moralities, messages or statements.
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Stanley is a forgettable character and Michael Jeffery is fine, but not particularly memorable either. The same goes for the protagonist’s brother. The father is a pretty bad man, but I did like his eventual decision to repent and save his daughter. That is the only moment of his where he made a good impression. John St. Polis’ acting, though, is too over-the-top at times.
Now this film is most memorable and important for bringing Mary Pickford her first and only Oscar win. Her performance admittedly is far from great as she overplayed the Southern accent a bit in my opinion and sometimes she struggled. However, her performance is still far from mediocre as most would say today and although she lobbied extensively for her Oscar win which is troublesome, at least she wasn’t an entirely terrible choice for a winner. She was terrific for her talkie debut, she’s charismatic, sweet and very emotive. She got a pretty thankless role and she most certainly elevated it with her solid performance.
Coquette was released in the first year of talkies which is 1929. And although dated by today’s standards, the movie is actually pretty advanced for its time as they used cutting-edge sound technology and thus the end results aren’t as mediocre as in most cases from this year. I could definitely hear them speak properly and there wasn’t a lot of background noise which I appreciated.
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The camera movements are pretty mediocre though and the film definitely felt very stagey. But it was adapted from stage and the story did not demand a more cinematic approach so I was fine with that aesthetic. I liked the first half quite a bit, the dialogue was mostly pretty good and the film is short and sweet, but the second half is so problematic in so many ways that it ended up being a very weak film.
Coquette brought Mary Pickford her only Oscar and although she isn’t great, she is pretty good for the material she got and quite stupendous having in mind that this is her first talkie. As for the movie itself, it is engaging and short with good dialogue, but so incredibly sappy, melodramatic and needlessly sadistic in the treatment of its protagonist. It truly did end on a very sour note.
