"Belle of the Nineties" returns to familiar milieu of the Gay Nineties, which West mined for a fortune in "Diamond Lil"/"She Done Him Wrong." Emily Wortis Leider observes that the plot was derived from "The Constant Sinner," West's 1931 play about an affair between a black prizefighter and a white gangster moll, except that in this screen version, the black Money Johnson became the white Tiger Kid. This is understandable, because it was during the production of "Belle" that significant pressures began to mount against West and Paramount by a shrill tide of moralism rising from church organizations and local governments. The Hays Office responded by replacing Dr. James Wingate with the strident Catholic lay-crusader Joseph Breen to head its influential Studio Relations Committee. The color of the male lead wasn't the only thing to change; Leider and Jon Tuska describe numerous bits, gags and plot devices that were either altered or excised entirely. The resulting picture suffers from disjointed scenes, hastily injected plot patches, a "Troubled Waters" song sequence which is inventive but simply unexplained within the story, and plot twists in the final three sequences (detailed below) that obviously were inserted to comply with Breen's insistence that every evil be punished and every good rewarded. I can think of few more irritating examples of prior restraint and its condescending and paternalistic assumptions in determining which forms of expression we are allowed to see.

Still, there's plenty to go on here, including a corsetful of snappy lines; the accompaniment of Duke Ellington and his band, whose involvement West insisted upon over the studio's vigorous objections; nice cinematography by Karl Struss; and beautiful costumes by Travis Banton, including an novel costuming sequence at the opening that culminates in her famous "Statue of Libido" pose, so dubbed by critic George Jean Nathan. It retains plenty of that rollicking charm of "She Done Him Wrong" and "I'm No Angel."

PLOTLINE

Ruby Carter of St. Louis is the most popular entertainer in the country, and her lover is the fighter Tiger Kid. The Kid's manager, Kirby, tries to discourage their relationship as distracting to the Kid's rising career, but his counsel is rebuffed by the lovers. So, through his shady friends and a phony phonecall, Kirby convinces the Kid that Ruby is cheating on him and should be dropped. Finally persuaded, the Kid ends their affair with a Dear Jean letter. Kirby follows with a call on the puzzled Ruby, to convince her to leave the Kid alone. This time, Ruby is receptive, and accepts an offer from proprietor Ace Lamont to travel to New Orleans to appear at his club.

Ruby steams to the Big Easy, and on Lamont's arm, she is the toast of the town. Lamont's jealous fiance treatens both him and Ruby, who subsequently distances herself from him and accepts the favors of other men like Claybourne, who lavishes her with diamonds. After Ruby's smash debut at Lamont's Sensation House, Lamont comes on to her, but she rebuffs him. He notices her new diamonds, and still hopeful of winning her, he concocts a plan to have them stolen so she'll be shaken and rely on him for protection.

The Tiger Kid arrives in New Orleans and signs as the contender in a championship bout being arranged by Lamont. Lamont agrees to give him the shot only if he'll do a small favor: rob Ruby of her diamonds while she and Lamont are driving together outside of town. The masked Kid does the job, without discerning Ruby's face in the shadows, and rides off. As Lamont feigns outrage, Ruby wonders aloud why the bandit didn't pilfer Lamont's own very ostentatious jewelry. Back at the hotel, a suspicious Ruby peeks through the door into Lamont's adjoining room, and observes the Tiger Kid handing her diamonds to Lamont, who stashes them in his safe. Later that night, Ruby and the Kid see each other at the club, and she hides her anger at him because she has a plan of her own.

Lamont is Ruby's escort to the fight, and she asks him to securely store her remaining jewels while they are out. He leaves her momentarily to deposit them in his safe, while through the door she spies the combination over his shoulder using her theater glasses. At the fight, Ruby sits ringside with Lamont in the Kid's corner, watching the bout (as Mae West loved to do in real life). Lamont has staked much of his money on the Kid, and Ruby has been slyly urging many others to bet against the Kid. Far into the fight (the twenty-seventh round or so), Ruby slips a mickey finn in the Kid's waterbottle, and then between rounds urges Lamont to hand the Kid some much-needed water. The Kid is KOed in the next round.

Back at the club, Lamont puts off his creditors and goes to get the cash to settle his debts. Meanwhile, Ruby has cleaned out his safe. Lamont tells her he is taking his money and leaving without paying, and torching the club behind him, and begs her to run with him. To stall for time, she agrees, and when he leaves, she tells her maid Jasmine (played by West's real maid, Libby Taylor) to pack their things for a hasty exit. The Tiger Kid calls on Ruby, who tells him that Lamont drugged him during the fight.

Lamont douses his room with gasoline, then is furious to discover he's been robbed. His fiance bursts in on him, and he knocks her unconscious and locks her in the closet. Next, the Tiger Kid enters the room for revenge, and the two men fight. Lamont hits his head in a fall and dies. In a panic, Tiger returns to Ruby to tell her about Lamont's accidental death, and convinces her he was duped by Lamont into robbing Ruby's diamonds.

She urges the Kid to prepare to run, then she sets Lamont's room ablaze with her cigarette--within the plot, her action would seem intentional, especially after she seems to have struck upon a brainstorm and then expertly flicks her smoke across the room. But the filmmakers clearly had to tread lightly with a subject like arson, and the scene is filmed as if Ruby were aiming for the fireplace and then is shocked to discover a raging fire, even grabbing a pillow to try smothering the blaze. The fire spreads rapidly. The woman in the closet awakes and screams. Ruby and the Kid rescue her, and the Kid carries her to safety. Before fleeing, Ruby takes the trouble amidst the flames to phone the emergency to the authorities, then conspicuously remarks, "I did the best I could."

If some of that last action sounds stilted, the sequences following are worse. Lamont is mourned by firemen at the scene: "Too bad, he was a great fellow." (I don't know how that fits within the plot, or remedies the iniquities in the script). Then, a few screaming headlines trumpet that Lamont was killed before the fire, that the Tiger Kid is charged with murder, and that the Tiger Kid is exonerated. Worst of all, the last scene shows Ruby marrying the Kid, happily ever after, unprecedented for a Mae West vehicle. The Hays Office is all over this one. It's vandalism.

• Return to Mae West's films.
• Return to 611 Ravenswood--The Cybersuite of the Legendary Mae West.

Updated June 5, 1998.