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Cult Review
Senior Film Conservator
If you have a soft spot for pre-code melodrama, Midnight Morals is a neat little time capsule. It’s definitely for people who like their stakes domestic and their character arcs predictable.
If you need high-octane thrills or modern pacing, stay away. You will probably find it slow, stiff, and maybe even a bit boring.
Watching this felt like stumbling onto a dusty shelf in the back of an old bookstore. The plot is thin, mostly just a rookie cop trying to figure out if his girl is "good enough" for his family. Rex Lease plays that wide-eyed sincerity pretty well, even if he looks like he's constantly about to sneeze.
The dance hall scenes are the real highlight for me. There is something about the way the background extras move that feels so authentically messy. It’s not polished like a big studio production. It feels like they just let the cameras roll while people actually tried to dance.
Alberta Vaughn has this way of looking at the camera that makes you wonder what she was thinking about between takes. She’s definitely the glue holding this together. Without her, the movie would just be another lecture on parental disappointment.
It reminded me a little of the family friction in Something to Think About, though this one is a lot less concerned with being profound. It’s just a story about a guy who likes the wrong girl.
The father character, played by DeWitt Jennings, is basically a human roadblock. He’s so grumpy he almost becomes funny. There’s a scene where he’s just sitting in a chair, lecturing his son, and the lighting is so weirdly dramatic it makes him look like a villain in a silent horror flick. It’s distracting, but in a fun way.
It’s not a masterpiece. It doesn’t even try to be. But sometimes that’s exactly what you want on a Tuesday night. 💃