Underplayed Gems

Child Bride (1938)

Child Bride poster
Directed by
Harry Revier
Genre
drama film, exploitation film
Country
United States
Runtime
1h 02m
Rating
4.6 of 10 from 37 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

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How it feels

A girl in a remote Ozarks town faces pressure to enter a child marriage. The movie shows these events to argue against the lack of laws preventing them.

outdatedexploitativecontroversialslowmelodramaticgrimsensationalist

What happens

Child Bride, also known as Child Brides, Child Bride of the Ozarks and Dust to Dust (US reissue titles), is a 1938 American drama film written and directed by Harry Revier, and produced by Raymond L. Friedgen. It was promoted as educational in an attempt to draw attention to the lack of laws banning child marriage in many states. Set in a remote town in the Ozarks, the film was very controversial at the time—both for its theme and because of a topless and nude swimming scene by then–12-year-old Shirley Mills. The film bypassed the onscreen nudity ban under the Hays Code by being produced and distributed independently of the studio system, and by claiming to be educational. Although the film was banned in many areas, its controversial nature gave it a certain infamy and it played on the so-called exploitation circuit for many years. Child Bride was one of Revier's last. His previous work included a variety of low-budget, independent features including The Lost City series and Lash of the Penitentes. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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