Girl 27

This is in response to mravenwud's comment. You say that "girls are incredibly naive about men's sexuality" and that "they should not let themselves be left alone EVER in a place where there are men drinking". Why are you placing the blame for what happened to Patricia Douglas on her own shoulders? Are you saying that men are all naturally rapists, and that if women don't guard themselves carefully, they can expect to be violated? That does a disservice to both men and women, in my opinion.

Attitudes like this are part of the reason why it is so heartbreakingly difficult, even today, for people who have been raped to come forward with their stories. Patricia Douglas didn't do anything wrong. She didn't "let herself" get raped-- she WAS raped.

I have rather mixed feelings about this movie. It brings up an interesting, forgotten scandal, which I give it credit for. But I felt the movie was always straining a little too hard to be interesting, as though the filmmaker knew he really only had a 40-minute short but was determined to get a feature length film out of it.

The movie is a mix of a documentary about the rape and a documentary about uncovering the rape, and I found that an interesting, fairly successful approach. The various film clips range from relevant to flippant. The filmmaker's worst instincts came out during the interviews with the victim. Tossing in film clips earlier made a certain amount of sense, but doing the same thing during her painful answers felt gimmicky and insensitive and just took away from the power of the scene. Sometimes you have to be willing to let a person or a situation speak for itself, but that doesn't happen in this movie.

I was glad to see that many of the other comments felt like I did - that this was a very compelling story - a story that should be brought to light, but that it is very badly handled by the inexperienced filmmaker. Now David Stenn is a talented writer and my friends who devour Hollywood biographies speak very highly of his (I believe he's written about Clara Bow and other big Hollywood Golden Era stars) and it is interesting how he came across this awful scandal that was covered up by MGM but he seems to not trust the power of poor Ms. Douglas' story and I actually was cringing with the horrid decision to add Hollywood movie clips of women being shaken or slapped or pushed down (from various fiction films) - as Ms. Douglas begins to tell of the actual sexual assault and how it destroyed her - the forced clips almost seemed to parody what was happening (which I am sure is the opposite effect the director wanted). The way the story is told, the way he films a lot of the interviews - it is just amateurish. I read the article Stenn wrote in Vanity Fair and that is much more complex and fascinating than the film. Hollywood truly had the power to sweep all of its dirty secrets under a large rug and this story is a perfect example of that. Ms. Douglas was a very brave woman to even try and stand up to MGM but of course they crushed her with newspaper lies and huge powerful law firms. The film is still worth watching because of the subject matter but as far as documentary skill - it truly fails.

A documentary that could have used a lot less of the documenter, David Stenn spends far to much time on camera and does, what is to me the death kiss of documentaries. Stenn's editing forces his audience to see thing his way and no other, to feel the emotions he feels and to come to all the same conclusions he does. This is in no way anything new to documentaries, Michael Moore for example is the very master of this, now to be fair, does that mean these film makers viewpoints are wrong, no not at all, sometimes they are right on with mine but for heaven sakes let me come to my own opinion honestly. Give me both sides of a story fairly as best as possible and let me use my brain to decide which I believe. Now, I do realize in the case of Girl 27 there is no real way to show both sides, and to listen to Patricia Douglas talk I have no doubt in my mind that she is an honest woman, but it degrades her to surround her story with unfair edits of MGM convention footage with sinister music overplaying. Also on a side not I found the story about Loretta Young & Clark Gable's daughter to be heartbreaking, to hear Judy Lewis tell her story was one of the saddest things I have ever heard, it made me loose a lot of respect for those two actors. Anyway, David Stenn, let Patricia Douglas tell her story, realize what you have in that, it is all your film needs. The bravery of that women to do what she did in both her situation and during that time period is amazing, and for her to go in front of a camera and re-tell that to the world is to be admired.

Are you serious, NY Times? Much appreciation for the courage and bravery this woman mustered when she was just a girl facing the legal monster of MGM and its public office cronies. As far as I'm concerned, she was raped multiple times by the Hollywood machine, her own mother, the legal system. Is it any wonder she developed a thick protective shield and does not trust people. But The NY Times refusal of the obituary was the topper for me...who reads your scummy rag anyway, you birdcage liner.