randy_byers | Borzage themes

Street Angel (1928) is about a prostitute who is redeemed by the love of a good man. It's a variation on the theme of Seventh Heaven (1927), although in that one the prostitution is heavily disguised. (Many people think the Zasu Pitts character in Lazybones (1925) is a prostitute who got pregnant, but in that one it's even more heavily disguised. She says she married a sailor who was then lost at sea. However, this story is so readily dismissed and dropped from the narrative that it looks to be a subterfuge. Still not sure I buy the subtextual reading, however.) Even in Street Angel, Janet Gaynor only tries to prostitute herself, but fails. Furthermore, there's another prostitute in the story who is truly a bad girl and is used to contrast with the "good prostitute" (i.e., redeemable) played by Gaynor.

One reason that Seventh Heaven is probably a better movie than Street Angel is that the Charles Farrell character is redeemed as well, whereas in Street Angel he plays an idealistic type who is brought back to earth. In Seventh Heaven the redemption is mutual, whereas Street Angel is a more conventional story of the bad girl saved by the good man. Still, it's a little more complicated than that, and Borzage is a master of showing us emotional and spiritual transitions in various directions. The climax of Street Angel is a very powerful confrontation between Gaynor and Farrell after she gets out of prison and his disillusionment with her and with love threatens to turn murderous. The sequence in which they unknowingly wander toward each other through the dense fog is an amazing visual metaphor for emotional numbness and isolation. The final confrontation, with Farrell's angry face masked in dark shadow while Gaynor's face remains open and vulnerable, was perhaps echoed in the confrontation between Herbert Marshall and Marlene Dietrich in Sternberg's Blonde Venus (1932), which plays on similar themes of the fallen woman -- creating a scenario in which the woman has to prostitute herself to save the life of the man she loves. (Sternberg's The Docks of New York (1928) is very similar to Seventh Heaven in its story of a world-weary prostitute and inarticulate working-class mug who redeem each other through love.)

Fallen women melodramas were very popular during the Depression. They seem archaic now, and yet Borzage is exploring themes of trust and betrayal and possession and self-sacrifice that still seem very fresh and pertinent. On the other hand, Seventh Heaven and Street Girl both resolve into happy endings of transcendent love. Lazybones is perhaps more interesting in its completely inappropriate ending that leaves us feeling confused and dissatisfied.

Yet Street Angel's dreamy imagery of spirits in transition persists. Redemption comes only after trials, turmoil, doubt and despair. Cinema is at its strongest wandering in night and fog.