Slander House (1938) User Reviews

Beautiful Adrienne Ames

[kidboots · 6/10 · 6 May 2015]

Gee, Adrienne Ames was beautiful and how, she could polish up any movie she was in and this one needed some elbow grease!! A role she was born to play, Mme Helene, the proprietor of a Park Avenue rejuvenation salon - very easy for her to persuade older, often desperate women to sign up for her basic beauty program. With wise cracking Pert Kelton as her receptionist ("I'd like to marry a man like you as long as he wasn't too much like you"!!) and lovely Esther Ralston as a trouble making client, the men are just an after thought!! I thought this was going

to be an expose of the beauty business but the salacious title was just a ruse for some romantic shenanigans!!

Helen is all set to marry solid, dependable Dr. Stallings (George Meeker could almost play the role in his sleep) - she doesn't love him but, according to him, that will come. Enter playboy Pat Felton (Craig Reynolds) who gives her life the excitement it is lacking. It is a case of love at first sight for him and the rest of the movie is spent trying to patch up obstacles thrown in his path by Ralston who plays a jealous ex-girlfriend. Helene has her share of admirers as well - George Horton (Edward Keene) whose wife is a client of Helene's - he feels she is a back number (that old 30s phrase!) and needs to spruce herself up!! This must have been Dorothy Vaughan's movie moment as it is the film's highlight. She is satisfied with Helen's explanation about accidentally running into her husband (the beauty shop gossips try to make something lewd out of it) but the snide remarks and cruel laughter of the cats prompt her to take drastic action which also helps Helen make up her mind about her own future.

Nothing earth shattering or memorable.

Limited Success

[boblipton · 5/10 · 22 November 2019]

Adrienne Ames runs a fitness center dedicated to getting the overstuffed wives of the upper crust into some shape. She's in the process of getting engaged to Dr. George Meeker, who's quite goofy about her in a staid way, when Craig Reynolds walks in and makes a serious play for her.

Miss Ames is lovely, wears her clothes well, and moves right. However, her line readings are a bit mechanical, and Reynolds' breezy personality, coming out of nowhere does not mix well in this comedy-drama. Director Charles Lamont has filled the ranks of the ladies, clients and staff, with some excellent farceurs, including Pert Kelton (in a rare non-annoying role), Viviane Oakland, Dot Farley, and the ever-dependable Mary Fields.

There is also some good slapstick, some of its involving the weight-reduction machinery, and a monkey that gets loose in the place. Esther Ralston plays Reynolds' ex-girlfriend who won't let her go (I'll take her!), but the occasionally clunky dialogue, the too-brief running time, and the lack of ability of the two leads limit the pleasure of this Poverty Row effort.

More like a hen house.

[mark.waltz · 5/10 · 16 April 2019]

"Pick-a-little, talk-a-little, pick-a-little, talk-a-little, cheap cheap cheap, pick-a-lot, talk-a little more."

So sang the uppity women of River City in Meredith Willson's "The Music Man", demonstrating the gossip based simply on rumor, not fact. Those "ladies" had nothing on the gossip mongers of Adrienne Ames' house of beauty where the clientele of bored, overweight rich businessmen's wives manipulate a nice member of their group into a suicide attempt, simply out of their jealousy of the younger Ames whom they are trying to discredit as a homewrecker. This threaten to destroy her relationship with a handsome Craig Reynolds oh stands by her in spite of the gossipy old biddies, which includes silent leading actress Esther Ralston. Dorothy Vaughan gives a touching performance as the sensitive wife of a businessman bored in his marriage who still loves his wife in spite of her diminishing glamour.

Made on a shoestring budget, this sensationalist film does not mince words with its view of society matrons with only gossip and destruction on their mind. Certainly, the women who work for Ames aren't much help, basically telling them to their face that they are way past their prime, and not so discreetly. The script has many witty wisecracks at these women's expense, and certainly many of them deserve much more in terms of their personal character which Ames gives them at the end like Clara Blandick did to Margaret Hamilton in "The Wizard of Oz". In a sense, it's a moral tale about the evils of gossip, a reminder of the Book of James which devotes an entire chapter to the evils of "the tongue".

Ironically, Pert Kelton, who was on the outside looking in at the gossipy towns women in "The Music Man", plays Ames assistant and sarcastic best friend. She delivers each of her lines as if she was pouring a whole bottle of vinegar on to a salad, and that delightful no-nonsense voice is put to good use. She steals every scene that she is in, and thus the film. There is a very funny scene involving an adorable spider monkey that seems like something you'd see in an Our Gang short. This may not be the most subtle of screenplays on the evils of flapping one's lips more than one should, but it certainly is extraordinary entertaining!More like a hen house.

Written by an angry man!

[planktonrules · 2/10 · 1 August 2011]

"Slander House" has some of the most bizarre axes to grind. After all, according to this film, all rich society ladies are really just nasty, fat, old cackling fools. And, men cheat on these wives because the women deserve it. And, if you stalk and harass a woman enough, eventually she'll marry you!!! Talk about a sick story!

Madame Helene operates a spa and fat farm for nasty fat rich ladies. While she's nice about her clientèle, her best friend (Pert Kelton) and other employees refer to them as 'old battleships' and other nice appellations. And, these women live up to this in the film, as they are almost comically stupid and annoying. A weird guy suddenly begins stalking Helene and insists they should marry--though she's never met the guy! And, the crazy guy's lawyer then begins sexually harassing Helene big-time--and the stupid, fat and ugly society women begin blaming innocent Helene for being a home-wrecker. By the end of the film she does what any logical woman would do--she marries the stalker and lives happily ever after.

The bottom line is that this film looks as if it were written by a very, very angry man--one that HATES rich women. All the ladies portrayed in the film are lazy slobs who deserve to have cheating husbands!! What a terrible film--and a film that never once seems believable or entertaining--just mean-spirited and cruel. What a weird little film.

By the way, Kelton later became the first actress to play Alice Kramden on "The Jackie Gleason Show". Nowadays, few would remember this.

Really wonderful precursor to "The Women"; made on the cheap, but well worth the 65 minutes!

[mmipyle · 7/10 · 6 May 2021]

"Slander House" (1938) is actually a nice discovery, especially because it is a sort-of precursor to next year's (1939) "The Women". No where near as stinging with acid remarks as "The Women", nevertheless the breezy nonchalance, the drama, and the off-the-cuff humor that pervades "Slander House" is actually very well done. What it lacks is tighter direction and an even better script. The next year's film is a masterpiece. This is simply a cheap Progressive Pictures quickie with lots of old-time (though still young!) performers getting a check so they can eat. But...they did a very good job. The only problem as most see it: Craig Reynolds. Here was a performer who breezed through so many pictures in the early 30s, from features to serials, and may even have had a next decade stardom ahead of him, but WW II interrupted his career for four years, and when he returned his career plummeted. In 1949, after he'd been married to Barbara Pepper and had two children, he went out on a motorcycle and was killed in an accident at the age of 42. Anyway, his performance in "Slander House" is so breezy it seems to contrast with all the other performers, as if he's there to practice in place of the real performer. It's not bad, but it just doesn't seem to fit. Whether it's the writing or the performer, or both, it takes the film down a notch. The star, though: Adrienne Ames. What a beauty! And she's quite marvelous. Her rival in the female department: Esther Ralston. This former silent star has lost some of her appeal in looks, but she's very on-target as "the other" girl rival for Reynolds' affections. Then there's George Meeker. He's a doctor who's seemingly engaged to, or at least entangled with, Ames.

The setting: yes, it's the same as "The Women": a salon, only this is a reducing and exercise salon, anything to get into shape and lose the monkey pounds that are gained through negligence or alcohol or age or, or, or... The other characters are cats - women cats! Dorothy Vaughan, Vivien Oakland, Ruth Gillette, Mary Field. Ames' side-kick and partner is played by Pert Kelton. She dominates every scene she's in. She's wonderful. And there are Edward Keane and William Newell. They're the other men who interfere, who try to lech their ways into Ames' life or cause trouble of some sort. Rich and infidel, these men have influence and money to do as they wish - they think. But not with Ames.

This is well worth the watch. Cheap, but really good. It's certainly NOT "The Women", but it's 65 minutes I'd spend again. For the record, throughout the movie people keep calling the salon "Scandal House". Don't know if that was supposed to be the original title or not, but because there's a reporter involved throughout who does columns on the girls, it probably is worthy of the title "Slander House", not because of him, but because of what the women say about each other!

One for Ames and Meeker fans!

[JohnHowardReid · 7/10 · 27 January 2014]

Although Alpha's DVD informs us that "some sound and picture anomalies exist" on their print, I didn't notice any. In fact it's very attractively photographed by Mil Andersen. Aside from two or three full-face close-ups, Adrienne Ames looks really beautiful, She also delivers a convincing performance which – considering the unconvincing screenplay – ranks as quite an achievement. The fly in the ointment – both in fact and in the film – is a breezy, over self-confident "hero" in Craig Reynolds whom the script favors over George Meeker. I'll admit that George is not usually a young girl's fancy, but helped by the script here, he plays his role with a quite convincing charisma. Reynolds, on the other hand, comes over either as a brash, overly self-confident phony or simply as an undesirable pest. Fortunately, when it can tear itself away from our heroine's romantic entanglements, the script does manage a satiric look at the "beauty" business and the mature women gulled into spending a fortune in vain efforts to recapture their youthful attractiveness. And by his usual rather humble standards, Charles Lamont's direction is surprisingly slick.