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''Child Bride'', also known as ''Child Brides'', ''Child Bride of the Ozarks'' and ''Dust to Dust'' (US reissue titles), is a 1938"Child Bride (1938)
''
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''
American Film Institute The American Film Institute (AFI) is an American nonprofit film organization that educates filmmakers and honors the heritage of the History of cinema in the United States, motion picture arts in the United States. AFI is supported by private fu ...
. The film is widely listed as dating from 1938 (
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,
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,
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etc.), but the copyright date on the print of the film shown by
Turner Classic Movies Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie channel, movie-oriented pay television, pay-TV television network, network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcas ...
on January 12, 2014, and also the ones availabl
on YouTube
and th
Internet Archive
is "MCMXLIII" (1943). Despite this, lists it as 1941.
American
drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...
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 Child marriage is a practice involving a marriage or domestic partnership, formal or informal, that includes an individual under 18 and an adult or other child.* * * * Research has found that child marriages have many long-term negative co ...
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 Nude swimming is the practice of swimming nudity, without clothing, whether in Body of water, natural bodies of water or in swimming pools. A colloquial term for nude swimming is "wikt:skinny dip, skinny dipping". In both British and American E ...
scene by then-12 year old Shirley Mills. The film bypassed the onscreen nudity ban under the
Hays Code The Motion Picture Production Code was a set of industry guidelines for the self-censorship of content that was applied to most motion pictures released by major studios in the United States from 1934 to 1968. It is also popularly known as th ...
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 Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...
features including ''The Lost City'' series and ''Lash of the Penitentes''.


Plot

Miss Carol (Diana Durrell) is an idealistic teacher in a remote one-room schoolhouse. A native of the Ozarks herself, she is determined to stop the practice of
child marriage Child marriage is a practice involving a marriage or domestic partnership, formal or informal, that includes an individual under 18 and an adult or other child.* * * * Research has found that child marriages have many long-term negative co ...
, in which older men marry teen or preteen girls. Her campaign raises the ire of some local men, led by Jake Bolby ( Warner Richmond), who one night drags her into the woods and ties her to a tree, with the intention of
tarring and feathering Tarring and feathering is a form of public torture where a victim is stripped naked, or stripped to the waist, while wood tar (sometimes hot) is either poured or painted onto the person. The victim then either has feathers thrown on them or is r ...
her. Before this can be done, however, Angelo the dwarf ( Angelo Rossitto) and Mr. Colton (George Humphreys) arrive with a shotgun to save the day. Following this, Jake Bolby comes across young Jennie Colton (Shirley Mills) swimming naked. When her father dies, Bolby decides to take advantage of the opportunity to
blackmail Blackmail is a criminal act of coercion using a threat. As a criminal offense, blackmail is defined in various ways in common law jurisdictions. In the United States, blackmail is generally defined as a crime of information, involving a thr ...
her mother into letting him marry the girl, threatening that otherwise he will see her hanged for murder. After he "courts" Jennie by giving her a doll, the two are married. It later turns out that this ceremony was illegal, as child marriage had been banned several days prior, but this point quickly becomes moot. Before Bolby can consummate the union, he is gunned down by Angelo. Jennie leaves his house with Freddie Nulty (Bob Bollinger).


Cast

* Shirley Mills as Jennie Colton (Girl) * Bob Bollinger as Freddie Nulty (Boy) * Warner Richmond as Jake Bolby * Diana Durrell as Miss Carol (Teacher) * Dorothy Carrol as Flora "Ma" Colton * George Humphreys as Ira "Pa" Colton * Frank Martin as Charles, Asst. D.A. * George Morell (Rex Baxter) as Mike Nulty * Angelo Rossitto (Don Barrett) as Angelo the dwarf * Al Bannon as Happy Cast notes: * This was Shirley Mills' first role and she would later appear in ''
The Grapes of Wrath ''The Grapes of Wrath'' is an American realist novel written by John Steinbeck and published in 1939. The book won the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and it was cited prominently when Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize ...
'' in 1940. She would go on to appear in many films over the next decade, mostly in supporting roles. She quit acting in her twenties to become a singer. * This was Bob Bollinger's only film role. According to Mills' website, now offline, the two young actors became friends, and Bollinger later asked her to marry him, which she declined. His ultimate fate is unknown. * Angelo Rossitto had a long career in movies, stretching from the 1920s to the 1980s, usually in less heroic roles than in this film. He is perhaps best known for his role as Master in '' Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome'' (1985). The reason he was billed as "Don Barrett" in this film is unknown. * Along with Mills and Rossitto, Warner Richmond was one of the few actors involved in this film who had any sort of film career. He appeared in over 140 films between 1912 and 1946, including the
Gene Autry Orvon Grover "Gene" Autry (September 29, 1907 – October 2, 1998), nicknamed the Singing Cowboy, was an American actor, musician, singer, composer, rodeo performer, and baseball team owner, who largely gained fame by singing in a Crooner ...
serial '' The Phantom Empire'' (1935).


The nude swim scene

The movie is perhaps best known for the topless and lengthy
nude swimming Nude swimming is the practice of swimming nudity, without clothing, whether in Body of water, natural bodies of water or in swimming pools. A colloquial term for nude swimming is "wikt:skinny dip, skinny dipping". In both British and American E ...
scene by 12-year-old Jennie, which begins with Jennie and Freddie, her closest friend, sneaking slyly to a secluded pond in the woods, where they had swum naked many times in the past. Freddie tells Jennie that he will "beat erundressed", but Jennie tells him that they can no longer swim naked together. Freddie asks her why, and Jennie replies "because we're not what we used to be" because she is now grown up. She repeats what she has been told by her teacher, Miss Carol. Freddie asks how they are different, pointing out that he had seen her many times in the nude, and Jennie turns to answer him, briefly exposing her
breast The breasts are two prominences located on the upper ventral region of the torso among humans and other primates. Both sexes develop breasts from the same embryology, embryological tissues. The relative size and development of the breasts is ...
s and
nipple The nipple is a raised region of tissue on the surface of the breast from which, in lactating females, breast milk, milk from the mammary gland leaves the body through the lactiferous ducts to Breastfeeding, nurse an infant. The milk can flow th ...
s to the camera. The film then cuts to a lengthy
long shot In photography, filmmaking and video production, a wide shot (sometimes referred to as a full shot or long shot) is a shot that typically shows the entire object or human figure and is usually intended to place it in some relation to its surro ...
showing Jennie and Freddie, both topless and separated by a stand of trees, as they discuss how these changes will affect their relationship. Freddie asks if he can still kiss Jennie; she replies that he can but only when she is wearing her clothes. Jennie then removes her dress entirely, runs naked through the woods and dives into the water. The next two minutes consist of shots of Jennie swimming nude and frolicking with her dog. Jake Bolby appears on a ridge above the pond, and watches the naked girl. An old woman sees what Bolby is doing, and says to him, "Purty, ain't she?" Freddie hears this and alerts Jennie to the fact that someone is watching her, and she swims for cover. She asks Freddie to bring her clothes to her, without looking at her. He uses a long stick to pass her the dress. She pulls the dress on, unseen to the camera, and climbs out of the water. Some prints and screenings of the film have cut out the topless scene, leaving only the long shot nude swim sequence.


Production

''Child Bride'' was the first film produced by noted
exploitation film An exploitation film is a film that seeks commercial success by capitalizing on current trends, niche genres, or sensational content. Exploitation films often feature themes such as suggestive or explicit sex, sensational violence, drug use, nudi ...
producer and promoter Kroger Babb, who marketed it as an educational film and who would reissue it under various titles, including ''Child Brides'', ''Child Bride of the Ozarks'' and ''Dust to Dust''. The movie is perhaps best known for the lengthy nude child swimming scene, which
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described as "completely gratuitous" and "obviously ''Child Brides main selling point and the reason for its longevity on the exploitation circuit." The film had been submitted to the
Production Code Administration The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the five major film studios of the United States, the mini-major Amazon MGM Studios, as well as the video streaming services Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. Fo ...
for a certificate of approval, but was denied because of its subject matter, which was said to be "a sexually abhorrent abnormality which violates all moral principles", and because of the onscreen child nudity. The censors also objected to the murderer never being punished for his deeds. The production of the film in 1938 followed shortly after mass media coverage of the 1937 marriage of 9-year-old Eunice Winstead to Charlie Johns, causing the film to be compared to it.


Home media

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's
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release presents the film in its uncensored form, while Mill Creek Entertainment included a censored version of the film in its 20 Movie Pack Cult Classics collection.
Kino Lorber Kino Lorber is an international film distribution company based in New York City. Founded in 1977, it was originally known as Kino International until it was acquired by and merged into Lorber HT Digital in 2009. It specializes in art film, art ho ...
has published the uncensored film on
Blu-ray Blu-ray (Blu-ray Disc or BD) is a digital optical disc data storage format designed to supersede the DVD format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released worldwide on June 20, 2006, capable of storing several hours of high-defin ...
as a double feature with '' Tomorrow's Children''. The film is now in the
public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...
.


Legacy

According to an interview with ''
Mystery Science Theater 3000 ''Mystery Science Theater 3000'' (abbreviated as ''MST3K'') is an American science fiction comedy television series created by Joel Hodgson. The show premiered on WUCW, KTMA-TV (now WUCW) in Saint Paul, Minnesota, on November 24, 1988. It then ...
'' writers Michael J. Nelson and Kevin Murphy, ''Child Bride'' was screened for potential use, but was considered too awful and disturbing, with Murphy saying that he needed "a good cry and a shower" afterwards. In a separate interview with staff writer Frank Conniff, who was responsible for selecting films for riffing, ''Child Bride'' was cited as the worst film watched as a potential selection—alongside '' Manos: The Hands of Fate'', which was used on the series in January 1993.


See also

* List of films in the public domain in the United States * Nudity in film


References

Note: The 1943 date cited refers to the copyright/release/re-release date. It was filmed in 1938/1939 because Shirley Mills was born in 1926, and it is widely known that she was 12 at that time, and not 17.


External links

* * * * {{Internet Archive film, id=ChildBride 1943 films 1943 drama films 1940s American films 1940s English-language films 1940s exploitation films American black-and-white films American drama films Articles containing video clips Astor Pictures films Child marriage in the United States English-language drama films Films about educators Films directed by Harry Revier Films set in the Ozarks Obscenity controversies in film