The Saturday Night Kid, 1929 banned poster under the Hollywood Code for Clara Bow lifting her dress.
The Hollywood Code
Even before audio was introduced to cinema many were already trying to censor what was shown on the big screen. In 1915 the Supreme court ruled “that free speech did not extend to motion pictures” in the case of ‘Mutual Film Corp. Vs. Industrial Commission of Ohio’.
William Hays was tasked to the job of cleaning up Hollywood, creating his ‘Hays Codes’ taken largely if not verbatim from Christian groups.
In 1924 Hays released his codes that would soon be adopted as the Motion Picture Production Code in 1930. The codes would not be enforced in Hollywood until late 1934 when films were required to be approved by the newly constructed Production Code Administration.
The moral ‘Codes’ would all but do away with any references to drugs stating absolutely no showing of ‘illegal traffic in drugs’ including ‘Methods of smuggling’ and even ‘The use of drugs’ altogether.
The code further added there was to be no ‘Sympathy for criminals’ shown or implied.
This enforcement hide humanities drug culture from popular culture all but erasing its memory….
Ahhh the good ol’ days of PreCode!
Sweet marijuana scene from the 1934 film ‘Murder at the Vanities’
Sweet Marijuana
A precode Clip from the 1934 film ‘Murder at the Vanities’ based on the 1933 Broadway musical of the same name. In the film just before the opening night of a musical a murder is committed… In a classic tale of the show must go on, the murder is investigated during the performance. Why not a little sweet marijuana during a investigation lol
Sweet Marijuana scene/song from the 1934 film ‘Murder at the Vanities’
one of the ‘flowers’ from the sweet marijuana scene