This ridiculous exploitation movie has a leading teen character (Mary Ainslee) who looked nearly as old as her on-screen mother, early 1930's B star Betty Compson. The divorced mom has a penchant for younger gigolos, even for bridge, and her troubled daughter is obviously influenced by her mom's lifestyle choices. All that glitters is not gold, and for these platinum females, that gold is the type that fools confuse with the real thing. While mom plays bridge (and makes a play for a very old looking 28 year old broke European count), daughter hangs out with her gang in another apartment, jitterbugging while others play strip poker. Mom's friends are silly old fools who either gossip about her or proclaim their love of the single meaningless life.
The jitterbugging is pretty well done (and definitely scandalous for 1940, showing an upside down girl exposing her panty's), but the tap dancing baton twirler is completely out of place. In fact, there's too much of the specialties and not enough plot in this film until the last reel that clocks in at just over an hour. The acting is atrocious with mother and daughter squabbling so unrealistically with idiotic lines so bad, you expect to catch them smirking in amusement over their absurdity.
It's obvious where the plot will go as one of Ainslee's friends (Betty Atkinson) ends up victimized by a prostitution ring (as advertised in the local as newspaper) and Ainslee makes a play for her mother's gigolo (Willy Castello) who is actually the moral conscience of the film. Unfortunately, in spite of the wacky plot and screenplay, there's actually very little to laugh at because the slow pacing which dominates the film until both Ainslee and Atkinson end up prisoners in a swank looking mansion that is really a bordello. Attempts for lavish sets still look cheap (a large bedroom isn't necessarily a glamorous one), and the anticipation of serious drama to explode takes forever to get going. Donald Kerr is brought in for several really idiotic scenes as the ditzy cab driver who somehow fits in to the film's outlandish conclusion. Not horrible, but missing the humor one expects from an overly dramatic moral tale.
The jitterbugging is pretty well done (and definitely scandalous for 1940, showing an upside down girl exposing her panty's), but the tap dancing baton twirler is completely out of place. In fact, there's too much of the specialties and not enough plot in this film until the last reel that clocks in at just over an hour. The acting is atrocious with mother and daughter squabbling so unrealistically with idiotic lines so bad, you expect to catch them smirking in amusement over their absurdity.
It's obvious where the plot will go as one of Ainslee's friends (Betty Atkinson) ends up victimized by a prostitution ring (as advertised in the local as newspaper) and Ainslee makes a play for her mother's gigolo (Willy Castello) who is actually the moral conscience of the film. Unfortunately, in spite of the wacky plot and screenplay, there's actually very little to laugh at because the slow pacing which dominates the film until both Ainslee and Atkinson end up prisoners in a swank looking mansion that is really a bordello. Attempts for lavish sets still look cheap (a large bedroom isn't necessarily a glamorous one), and the anticipation of serious drama to explode takes forever to get going. Donald Kerr is brought in for several really idiotic scenes as the ditzy cab driver who somehow fits in to the film's outlandish conclusion. Not horrible, but missing the humor one expects from an overly dramatic moral tale.