My Past (1931)

My Past is a 1931 Warner Brothers pre-code romantic melodrama.

John Thornley (Lewis Stone) is a wealthy middle-aged industrialist. He leaves the running of the business to his much younger workaholic partner, Bob Byrne (Ben Lyon). John prefers to spend his time lazing about on his yacht and chasing actresses.

For six years he’s been chasing musical comedy star Doree Macy (Bebe Daniels). He thinks that eventually he’ll catch her.

Then Bob meets Doree and becomes smitten with her. He’s a married man but he assures her that his wife Consuelo (Natalie Moorhead) is in Paris getting a divorce. You’d think an actress would be worldly enough not to fall for the oldest line in the book, but she falls for it.

You won’t be surprised to learn that Bob’s wife had no intention of divorcing him.

So now there’s a kind of romantic quadrangle, with Bob and John both chasing Doree while Doree and Consuelo compete for Bob. That’s it for the plot.

I do have some issues with this movie, primarily relating to character motivations. I just don’t buy John’s pathetic self-sacrificing emotional masochism. I don’t buy the idea that he’d spend six years chasing Doree without getting anything in return. It doesn’t gel with his hedonistic outlook. After a few months he would simply start chasing another actress, but he doesn’t. It’s totally at odds with everything else we know about him. It doesn’t ring true. I have a problem with characters who do things that are wildly out of character just because the script says so. It’s a sign of lazy writing. In this case it also leads us to despise the man, which weakens the movie’s emotional impact.

I also just didn’t like the heroine. She’s believable, but she’s a heartless manipulative woman. If she’d been meant as a calculating vamp that would have been fine but I get the impression that we’re actually meant to like her.

Does it have a pre-code flavour? Up to a point it does. It’s fairly explicit about the fact that Bob and his wife have a sexless marriage. It certainly implies that Bob and Doree sleep together. It tries to be daring in treating adultery casually but at times it’s a bit too coy. It does let Doree off lightly for trying to steal another woman’s husband. It wants to be naughty, but it pulls its punches a bit.

There’s a slightly nasty vibe to this movie. The message seems to be that lying and manipulating will get you everything you want while if you behave honourably you’ll wind up with nothing. The only really decent character in the movie is the one who ends up getting it in the neck.

I’m all for pre-code openness and pre-code lack of moral judgments on characters for minor indiscretions but I’m a bit uncomfortable with a movie that lets a louse like Bob off so lightly.

The acting is mostly fine. It’s not the fault of the players that the characters are badly written.

Ben Lyon is dull. Lewis Stone is fun. Bebe Daniels is good. Joan Blondell once again finds herself playing the heroine’s best friend and once again she steals every scene she’s in.

Ben Lyon and Bebe Daniels were married in real life which makes the total lack of onscreen chemistry between them rather puzzling.

My Past just didn’t work for me. The script is very weak. Doree and Bob are simply awful people that I didn’t care about. This might have worked if the movie had been played as a cynical comedy. My Past is not a terribly movie but it’s disappointing and it’s hard to recommend, even with Bebe Daniels and Joan Blondell in the cast.

The Warner Archive DVD is barebones as usual but it’s a nice transfer.