Beware of Married Men

In the twilight of the silent era, Beware of Married Men serves up a cynical, high-society cautionary tale centered on the predatory Leonard Gilbert. Played with a slick, reptilian charm by Richard Tucker, Gilbert is a professional bachelor whose apartment is a carefully calibrated machine of seduction. Outfitted with the period’s most aggressive symbols of 'class'—clinking cocktail shakers, an abundance of silk pillows, and the silent, racialized presence of a Japanese manservant—Gilbert hunts the naive. The narrative engine ignites when he sets his sights on the impressionable Helene Martin. This triggers a desperate intervention from her older sister, Myra, who must navigate the treacherous waters of Gilbert’s social circle to rescue Helene before her reputation is permanently scorched. It is a film that treats the bachelor pad as a battlefield and marriage as a shield that many characters are all too willing to drop.