company: Pathe Exchange
year: 1928
runtime: 113′ / 128′
country: United States
director: Cecil B. DeMille
cast: Lina Basquette, Marie Prevost,
Tom Keene, Noah Beery, Eddie Quillan
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THE GODLESS GIRL has the distinction of being Cecil B. DeMille’s final silent picture as well as his first talkie – originally produced and released in 1928 to less than enthusiastic box office returns, a new sound epilogue was shot [these additional scenes were shot by Fritz Feld with no supervision from DeMille - these sound elements have been preserved by the UCLA Film and Television Archive*] and tacked on for an equally unsuccessful re-release effort in 1929. Photoplay Productions [Kevin Brownlow and Patrick Stanbury] in conjunction with Film 4, the Cecil B. DeMille Foundation, and George Eastman House recently restored the original silent version of the film from the director’s own nitrate print with a new orchestral score provided by the remarkable Carl Davis – it was this version that I had the fortune of seeing when it aired on Turner Classic Movies recently [the restoration is available as part of a DVD box set in the US, though without the fine Davis score].

It is not generally known that there are Atheist Societies using the schools of the country as their battle-ground – attacking, through the Youth of the Nation, the beliefs that are sacred to most of the people. And no fanatics are so bitter as youthful fanatics.

Judy [Lina Basquette] is an atheist – the ‘godless girl’ of the title – and chairman of her high school’s secret Godless Society. She puts herself at odds with Bob [Tom Keene], the president of the student body and a zealous Christian, by distributing pamphlets and passing him taunting messages during class – Don’t be grouchy, Angel! Just because they swallow my pamphlets and choke on your hymns! one note reads. The principal of the school is disturbed by the distribution of the pamphlets for the Godless Society [This blasphemy is spreading through the school like a plague. It must be stopped! he says] and calls a meeting of the students in order to put an end to the problem. Rather than see Judy whisked away to prison under her state’s blasphemy laws, Bob pleads with the principal to let the student body fix the problem in their own way – guaranteeing that the issue will be eradicated post haste. The principal agrees to his proposal, but warns against using violence.

That night a meeting of the Godless Society is held in an abandoned building downtown – described by the inter-titles as A shabby hall, on a squalid street . . . where little rebels blow spit-balls at the Rock of Ages. Comic relief Bozo Johnson [Eddie Quillan, credited as the "goat" in the opening credits], a good Christian boy misguided by his attraction to Judy into joining the society, is about to become a member, but can’t bring himself to take the oath [which involves resting your hand on the Society's pet monkey, Koko, and disavowing God]. Ridiculed by the members, Bozo leaves the meeting and runs into Bob and his veritable army of young Christians – who are armed with eggs, apples, and brooms. It seems the principal’s warnings against violence will go unheeded. A massive fight ensues and, as the crowd heads out onto the stairs outside the meeting hall, the railing begins to crack – finally it gives way and the young secretary of the society plummets to the ground, dying in Judy’s arms [but not before effectively converting to Christianity in her final moments].

Judy, Bob, and Bozo take the fall for the incident and are sentenced to an undetermined amount of time in a reformatory. There they witness cruelty at the hands of a brutish head guard [Noah Beery, older brother to the arguably more famous Wallace] – he throws the switch on the electric fence while Bob and Judy talk through it, nearly killing both and leaving Judy with cross-like scars on her palms. After Bozo is beaten beyond recognition by the head guard, Bob makes the decision to escape – with the help of Judy’s newfound Christian friend Mame [Marie Prevost], the two young lovers are successfully on the run. While on the lamb they discover themselves and Judy begins to waver in her disbelief. Soon they are captured and dragged back to the reformatory, where both are thrown into solitary confinement. Then, disaster! A fire breaks out in the girl’s section, resulting in all manner of panic – Bob and the rather bandaged Bozo escape from solitary and attempt to rescue Judy, facing the brutality and newfound cowardice of the head guard along the way. Soon its the guard who is in trouble – mortally wounded by a suddenly electrified gate and helpless against the fire. Bob rescues Judy and the head guard, who in his dying moments recommends the four friends be released from the reformatory. Bozo, free again, runs off after his new flame Mame, while Bob and Judy ride of into certain happiness, having discovered love and faith along the way.

For a film who’s message is largely about the dangers of intolerance, the depiction of atheism found in THE GODLESS GIRL – the character of Judy is based very loosely on the story of Queen Silver ** – is rather intolerant itself. The atheists in the film distribute inflammatory pamphlets [with slogans like Join the Godless Society - Kill the Bible!] and behave generally nastily, throwing the first punch when it comes time for the big fight. The film also insinuates an implicit link between the theory of evolution [Judy announces at the meeting that Koko, the Godless Society's monkey, is their cousin - a gross misinterpretation of the theory] and atheism that simply doesn’t exist. DeMille and his writer’s sympathies clearly lie with those of the principal of the school – that atheism is a dangerous philosophy that must be routed. To his credit, DeMille is obviously not a supporter of the crowd of angry youth that storms the meeting of the Godless Society, which is portrayed as being every bit as venomous and nasty as the atheists they are targeting. As an inter-title suggests, this is not a battle of right against wrong but of Intolerance versus Intolerance.

The heart of the film, then, is not its anti-atheistic sentiment [which has largely fallen by the wayside by a third of the way through] but in its warning of the dangers of intolerance on the part of all people. It is made quite clear that both the Godless Society and Bob’s crowd of angry Christian youth are equally responsible for the death of the young girl. The only real innocent portrayed is in the character of Bozo – a mild mannered [if impossibly goofy] Christian moderate who doesn’t fit within either of the two competing groups and is a victim of the conflict between them. It is through his character that the audience comes to understand the brutality of the reform school system [the chief example of intolerance and cruelty to be found in the film] and his beating by the head guard what locks in any wayward audience sympathies for the plight of the main characters.

From a purely technical standpoint THE GODLESS GIRL is nearly flawless, with the photography being quite beautiful throughout – it’s easy to see why DeMille was as respected in the industry as he was. The scenes involving the massive reformatory [constructed especially for the production] are particularly stunning – the director is reported to have spent $200,000 in pre-production researching this aspect alone. The very real burning of the reformatory set [which resulted in several very real accidents] is easily the most memorable moment in the picture and one to rival the pathetically unreal action sequences often produced today. It doesn’t fare so well in a narrative sense, however – the love story, reformatory drama, and religious angles never manage to form a cohesive whole leaving THE GODLESS GIRL feeling like a bit of a jumble. The writing is also ridiculously dated, with dialogue rendered in a vernacular that would have been considered cliche and stereotyped even at the time of release. The film is rarely anything less than entertaining though, particularly during its final two thirds, with DeMille moving the action along at a nice brisk pace.

While not a success in either its silent or partial sound versions in America, the film found an unlikely warm reception in Europe and the Soviet Union. Adolf Hitler, no more than an aspiring politician at the time of release, was purported to be quite a fan of both the film and its star, to whom he sent a fan letter and, later, invited to Germany. In the Soviet Union THE GODLESS GIRL was re-cut, removing the final reel [the scenes of Judy redeemed], and released as a ‘celebration of atheism among American youth’* – certainly not the original intentions of the director!

In the end, this is a breathtakingly produced and worthwhile picture even with its rocky and insensitive opening [my apologies for harping on this point, but the misconceptions about atheism promoted by this film are some of the very same I had to deal with as a young atheist growing up] and disjointed narrative taken into account. The restoration by Photoplay Productions, et al, is quite stunning, as is the new orchestral score by Carl Davis. As previously noted, it is available without the Carl Davis score in the R1 DVD collection Treasures III: Social Issues in American Film [from Image Entertainment] while the Davis scored edition can be seen on Turner Classic Movies from time to time. As a film of ‘irrational yet compelling power’* this one comes recommended.

* THE GODLESS GIRL at UCLA’s Crank Film Society

** QUEEN SILVER was a young prodigy and activist who lectured on such issues as free thought and evolutionary theory in California and published a periodical that was the obvious inspiration for the pamphlets seen in this film.