Five and Ten (1931)

Five and Ten (later retitled Daughter of Luxury) is a 1931 MGM pre-code romantic melodrama. It was a star vehicle for Marion Davies, with her co-star being Leslie Howard who was not yet a major name in the United States.

The Depression is an important factor in many pre-code movies but it’s ignored completely in this movie which may reflect the fact that it’s based on a novel (by Fannie Hurst) written prior to the Wall Street Crash.

Five and Ten is a story of love but this is also very much a movie about the class struggle. No, not that class struggle. This is is not the capitalists vs the workers, the upper class vs the working class. This is class struggle within the upper classes. This is the old money blue blood American aristocracy vs the rising power of the nouveau riche new upper class. This was a very real class struggle, not just a device invented for the movie.

John Rarick (Richard Bennett) and his family represent the upstart nouveau riche. Rarick owned a chain of five and dime stories in Kansas. Now he owns an immense nationwide chain and he’s fabulously rich. That made him decide to relocate, with his family, to New York City.

His wife Jenny (Irene Rich) and daughter Jennifer (Marion Davies) are at first very excited. They assume that they will be welcomed into high society in New York. But New York is not Kansas City. They are snubbed by New York high society. And for a woman there is no humiliation to compare with being snubbed by society women.

Jenny has consoled herself by taking a lover. He gives the impression of being a gigolo but Jenny doesn’t care.

John Rarick has no idea what is going on and he had no idea how lonely and socially isolated Jenny had started to feel. The truth is that John Rarick has ceased to understand anything other than money.

He is also unaware that daughter Jennifer has been snubbed as well.

Now Jennifer has met Berry Rhodes (Leslie Howard). He’s an architect, or claims to be although he’s really just a dilettante. He spends his time playing polo and going to parties. Berry is perpetually broke but that doesn’t matter. He is a blue blood. His family is Old Money. As far as society in New York is concerned he is very much an insider. He is engaged, in a desultory fashion, to Muriel Preston (Mary Duncan), also very much of Old Money stock.

Jennifer has decided that she’s going to marry Berry. It’s impossible of course. There is that yawning class gap between them. But Jennifer is a very determined girl.

Perhaps she is motivated partly by a desire to storm the walls of the fortress of society but she is genuinely besotted by Berry’s aristocratic sophistication and self-confidence and stylish elegance.

And Berry has fallen for Jennifer, although that doesn’t mean he will choose a nouveau riche girl in preference to blue blood Muriel. It’s going to be an epic battle between these two women.

Meanwhile Jennifer’s brother Avery has turned to the bottle.

I adore Marion Davies. She’s funny, she’s lively, she’s charming and she’s sexy. She’s gorgeous and she has those incredible eyes. It’s unfortunate that she is often dismissed due to the vicious hatchet job Orson Welles did on her in Citizen Kane.

Leslie Howard is pretty good here and you can see why he would soon start making an impact in Hollywood.

Is it pre-code? The answer is very definitely yes but to tell you why would involve spoilers.

Five and Ten is an excellent pre-code melodrama and Marion Davies is sensational. And directed by Robert Z. Leonard, maybe not an auteur or a visionary but just a guy who directed a lot of excellent movies. Very highly recommended.

The Warner Archive DVD looks very nice.