The Godless Girl with Lina Basquette: This 1928 release was directed by Cecil B. DeMille, best remembered for the blockbusters Samson and Delilah (1949), The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), and The Ten Commandments (1956).- The Godless Girl (movie 1928) review: Directed by Cecil B. DeMille and written by Jeanie Macpherson, this compelling, thoughtful theological drama is bound to convert even the most hardened of cynics.
The Godless Girl (movie 1928) review: Cecil B. DeMille proves that he could go far deeper than what’s seen in his campy Judaeo-Christian epics
Directed by Cecil B. DeMille from a scenario by frequent collaborator Jeanie Macpherson (The Cheat, Male and Female, Madam Satan, etc.), the 1928 morality tale The Godless Girl was the filmmaker’s final silent movie. (Note: A 1929 version has added talking scenes handled by actor Fritz Feld.)
The Godless Girl also happens to be one film that took me totally by surprise.
For although the story starts out with a focus on seemingly conventional high-school brawls, in place of the usual “Sharks vs. Jets” what we get here are Atheists vs. Believers.
Freedom from Religion fighters
Fronting the Godless Society is Judy (former child actress Lina Basquette), a pretty brunette who has a crush on fellow student Bob, the Bible Boy – actually, Bob Hathaway (George Duryea, later known as B Western star Tom Keene), the head of the Christian youth organization.
Judy tries to recruit Bob to attend her Atheist meetings, but being the devout Christian that he is, Bob opts instead to form a gang of hoodlums to invade the gathering and beat those evil non-believers over the head with their Bibles.
At this point, I’m siding with the Atheists.
Swear on the monkey’s head!
At the Atheists’ meeting, the proselytes have to swear allegiance to the anti-religion cause by placing a hand on a monkey’s head – ostensibly representing Darwin’s theory of evolution. Theirs is a peaceful gathering until the Christian assault begins.
In the melee, one of the Atheist girls falls over the stairway rail to her death, at which time she miraculously becomes a believer and suddenly calls for the Good Lord.
Then the pace changes: The kids are put into a juvenile detention center and the real horrors begin.
Sadistic law enforcers
The guards are all sadistic and the punishments never fit the crime. And since both Believers and Non-Believers are treated with the same cruelty, their differences don’t seem to matter anymore.
That’s when Judy’s best friend, Mame (Marie Prevost), becomes a shining example of what a good Bible-believing Christian is really made of. She is compassionate and protective of her Atheist friend.
Meanwhile, on the boys’ side of the prison, Bob and his friends are subjected to all forms of torture. The brutality is convincingly depicted, as The Godless Girl becomes an indictment against inhumane conditions in the United States’ juvenile penal system.
God works in mysterious ways
Despite their religious disagreements – and even though they’re kept on different sides of the detention center – Judy and Bob learn that they love each other when they both get crosses burned into their hands after touching one another through the electrified fence.
The symbolism doesn’t stop there.
While Bob changes his prison tag, 7734, by turning it upside down and altering it with a marking pen to read HELL, Judy alters hers from 3107 to read LOVE.
As he is losing his faith, she is gaining hers.
The Godless Girl with Lina Basquette, Eddie Quillan, and a Darwinistic monkey. Cecil B. DeMille’s last silent turned out to be a commercial flop.Riveting conflagration
The lovers eventually make their escape.
They are caught. They are tortured.
The whole drama climaxes with a conflagration so impressive – so real – that I felt like I was there with them.
I have seldom been so caught up in a drama that my eyes were kept riveted to the screen. Never once did I want to look away.
That’s how compelling I found The Godless Girl.
Choose your own path
In fact, The Godless Girl haunted me for days.
I kept thinking of what point of view Cecil B. DeMille and Jeanie Macpherson (who also co-wrote the titles with Beulah Marie Dix) wanted their audience to take.
Did DeMille and Macpherson want us to side with the Believers?
But they are the ones who begin the attack that kills one of the students.
Or are we to side with the Atheists and forever be branded “Godless”?
Now I’m a Believer
That’s what I admire so much about The Godless Girl, an engrossing, thought-provoking drama that succeeded in disturbing my jaded passivity.
Granted, Judy becomes a God-fearing believer by the end, but at no time are the Atheists demonized or portrayed as evil. The viewer is free to identify with either side.
So thank you, Mr. DeMille and Ms. Macpherson, for shaking off my cynicism and making me a Believer once more.
Not in religion, but in the art of filmmaking.
The Godless Girl (movie 1928) cast & crew
Director: Cecil B. DeMille.
Screenplay: Jeanie Macpherson.
Titles: Jeanie Macpherson & Beulah Marie Dix.Cast: Lina Basquette, George Duryea (best known as Tom Keene), Marie Prevost, Noah Beery, Eddie Quillan, Clarence Burton, Richard Alexander, Mary Jane Irving, Hedwiga Reicher, Kate Price, Julia Faye.
Uncredited: According to online sources, Lyle Talbot and Robert Young are featured in bit parts.Cinematography: J. Peverell Marley.
Film Editing: Anne Bauchens.
Music: Carl Davis (for the 2007 restoration by Photoplay Productions and George Eastman House, in association with the Cecil B. DeMille Foundation and Film4).
Art Direction: Mitchell Leisen (as James Mitchell Leisen).
Producer: Cecil B. DeMille (uncredited).
Production Company: DeMille Pictures Corp.
Distributor: Pathé Exchange.
Running Time: 113 min.
Country: United States.
“The Godless Girl (Movie 1929): Cecil B. DeMille Makes You Believe” review text © Danny Fortune; excerpt, image captions, bullet point introduction, and notes © Alt Film Guide.
The Godless Girl (Movie 1929): Cecil B. DeMille Makes You Believe” notes
Fritz Feld
Robert Birchard’s Cecil B. DeMille’s Hollywood and Mark A. Vieira and Cecilia de Mille Presley’s Cecil B. DeMille: The Art of the Hollywood Epic mention actor Fritz Feld (Bringing Up Baby, Freaky Friday) directing The Godless Girl’s talking scenes, as Cecil B. DeMille had by then left Pathé for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Mitchell Leisen
The Godless Girl art director Mitchell Leisen (1898–1972) would become one of Paramount’s top filmmakers, whose credits include Death Takes a Holiday (1934), Murder at the Vanities (1935), Easy Living (1937), Midnight (1939), Hold Back the Dawn (1941), Lady in the Dark (1944), Kitty (1945), To Each His Own (1946), No Man of Her Own (1950), and The Mating Season (1951).
Among his stars were Fredric March, Carole Lombard, Jean Arthur, Claudette Colbert, Joan Bennett, Barbara Stanwyck, Ray Milland, Olivia de Havilland, Charles Boyer, Paulette Goddard, Joan Fontaine, Ginger Rogers, John Lund, Marlene Dietrich, Rosalind Russell, Gene Tierney, Dorothy Lamour, and Fred MacMurray.
The Godless Girl movie credits via the American Film Institute (AFI) Catalog website.
Eddie Quillan and Lina Basquette The Godless Girl movie image: Pathé Exchange.
“The Godless Girl (Movie 1929): Cecil B. DeMille Makes You Believe” last updated in April 2023.
3 comments
Well done article Lina Basquette a star that never became a star areal tragic story from being Sam Warner’s wife, to leave show business and become a highly respected Great Dane Breeder and dog judge.
I realize this review/blog is old, but I love running across new thoughts about this movie. You see, this was (to my knowledge), my father’s last. I was thrilled when it became available to purchase, and we now have not only a bit of film history, but a bit of family history, as well. It is, indeed, an epic and balanced offering of no-sidedness that is certainly still relevant today.
When many of us think of a DeMille film, we see thundering chariots, falling columns, lavishing sets & rich colour tones that don’t fade over time.
THE GODLESS GIRL is a must see. No doubt, it’s never been shown in a prison movie room