Under 18 (1931) ** (out of 4) A rather bland Pre-Code from Warner doesn't live up to any of its hype especially when you see the cast, the story and the innuendo in the title. Margie Evans (Marian Marsh) lives in poverty and thinks that marriage is the one way out but when her older sister (Anita Page) gets married and still lives poor, she sees another chance of making good. At her factory she learns that rich men can give women what they want with a few "favors" and Margie meets a possible candidate in the womanizing Raymond Harding (Warren William). The story, the title, the suggestive language and throw in Marsh, Page and William and yet the end result is still rather bland and boring. I was really surprised to see how tame and uninteresting this Pre-code was and it really does seem like the studio was trying to do a Pre-code without all the naughty stuff. When I say naughty there's certainly not going to be anything X-rated but if you're a fan of this genre then you know Warner was the king and could deliver perfect entertainment. Several things struck me about this production and the majority of it goes back to the screenplay. The story is rather tame and for the life of me I couldn't understand some of the twists and turns in the story. I won't give away the ending but what happens to the William's character is just downright silly and it gets even double with yet another twist. The main female character is just as confusing because she sells herself so that her sister can get a divorce and you have to wonder what the point of this was since you could have had the sister being unhappy and going into the arms of William to get a divorce. At just under 80-minutes there's quite a bit of dialogue with some of it being funny but the majority of it just doesn't contain enough spice to make up for everything else going on. Marsh is pretty good here even though the screenplay doesn't offer her too much. Those who have seen the Edward G. Robinson film FIVE STAR FINAL will remember the charming Marsh. William is doing William like no one else could and Page is always entertaining even if she spends most of her screen time just fighting with the husband. The sexuality level is pretty low throughout even though it's hinted at at times. UNDER 18 has all the elements for a good Pre-code but sadly the screenplay gets lost one scene after another and in the end you can't help but see it as a disappointment.

Though it only has one star usually associated with Warner Brothers in the early 1930's - Warren William - and even he has a supporting role in relation to the now forgotten Regis Toomey, this film is just bursting with the attitude of precode Warner Brothers.It's subject is very definitely the depression and specifically how fortunes quickly changed for families when the male head of the household died. The beginning of the film is full of hope as the movie opens on the wedding day of Sophie (Anita Page), oldest daughter in the Evans family. However, three still-shots later - Dad's grave stone reading 1872-1928, a room for rent sign, and a pawn broker's store sign, and the audience is standing in the middle of a crowded tenement neighborhood in New York City in 1931. Youngest daughter Margie is working as a seamstress, living in a complete dump with her mother, and her boyfriend is making annoying happy talk about how their next big break is just around the corner. What is just around the corner is that sister Sophie, her husband Alf (Norman Foster), and their baby are moving into Margie and Mom's cramped quarters because they have just lost everything. Worse, Alf doesn't think that getting a regular job is a priority.The daring subject that is insinuated here but never mentioned specifically is abortion. After Alf hits Sophie when she objects to him taking what little money they have and betting on himself in a billiards tournament, she reveals to Margie that she wants a divorce from loafer Alf, and furthermore she's pregnant again. Margie talks about taking her to someone the other girls have talked about, and you do see her talking to a lawyer next, but you've got to wonder what else happened since that baby is never mentioned again.Unfortunately the girls are shocked to find out from the lawyer that a divorce costs 200 dollars, which they don't have. Margie has two places she can go for the money - her boyfriend, who has 800 dollars saved to start his own business but is dead-set against divorce under any circumstances, much more so against financing one. She could also go to playboy millionaire Raymond Harding (Warren William) who took a liking to Margie when he saw her stand in as a model at the fashionable dress shop where she works. He would certainly give her the money, but what will she have to do in return? This film is headed to a dark depression precode outcome when several credible good things happen and one rather outlandish thing happens that results in a rather preposterous happy ending. It's sad to think that Marian Marsh's career never really went anywhere. I've found her a delight in the three films in which I've seen her - Svengali, Beauty and the Boss, and this one. I'd recommend it to anybody who likes the precodes.

This is a very entertaining film and I enjoyed it very much, though I am quick to admit that it was far from sophisticated or polished. In so many ways, this is a wonderful example of a so-called "pre-Code" style of film--since it features story lines and dialog that would have been forbidden in Hollywood just a few years later thanks to pressure to actually enforce a rigid code of conduct and standards in film. Much of this pressure was not just from civic groups, but also due to flagging ticket sales, as the often explicit pre-Code films did well in urban areas but alienated so many other viewers. By today's standards, this film is relatively tame, but it's jaded views on marriage and sex may catch many today by surprise due to its frankness! The film starts with the younger sister (Margie) seeing her older sister get married and set off on the perfect life. However, soon afterwords, her father dies and she and her mother are forced to move to a low-rent apartment and life is a struggle. A bit later, her happy older sister and her husband and baby arrive--apparently the husband is really a lazy good-for-nothing and married life for sis is a living hell! In fact, throughout the first half of the movie, Margie is bombarded with so many messages that being a "nice girl" just doesn't pay and the way to get ahead is to sleep your way out of poverty! Granted that most times there is a friend or co-worker or boyfriend Jimmy who insists that in the long run this isn't true, but this view is definitely hard to believe based on how happy and successful the "bad girls" all seem to be! So, eventually, Margie feels compelled to try her hand at being bad--or at least by being a bit bad--by chasing rich playboy, Raymond Harding. Harding appears to be a very rich lecher and he seems so smitten with Margie that she seems sure to get the $200 she needs for her sister to divorce her rotten husband.The end of the movie is very satisfying to watch on one level but intellectually it seems like it was all very contrived. In other words, in the last few minutes of the film, the viewer was bombarded with a ton of wonderful endings that wrapped everything up too well to be believed. Few of these elements could rationally be believed, but for EVERYTHING to work out perfectly is a bit hard to accept. Plus, the final message of "nice girls really DO finish first" is muddled, as for so many bad girls in the film, they really did seem to end up better than the average nice lady! By the way, despite the title, there is no indication from the film that Margie or anyone else is underage and committing some sin! While Marian Marsh ("Margie") does look young, she seems to be playing a woman about 18 (her actual age at the time) and there's no mention of her being underage. I think the title was applied rather randomly--just in a jaded effort to encourage ticket sales due to salacious expectations by the audience! Also, Ms. Marsh just died last November--at the ripe old age of 93. Her older sister in the film, Anita Page, from what I can determine is still alive and as of 1/07, is in her 96th year!

The depression era drama "Under Eighteen" tells the story of Margie, a charming young woman in her late-teens with a heart of gold who wishes for something more for herself and her mother, who she supports with the little she can scratch together as a seamstress.A damper is put on her plans when her pregnant older sister brings along her somewhat abusive deadbeat husband and young baby to live with them. Things are complicated further when Margie tries to scrounge some cash together to help her sister pay the impending divorce attorney (although a brief allusion is also made to an abortion). What lengths will she go to for money to help her family?"Under Eighteen" is an interesting film with snappy dialogue that follows a surprisingly empowered female lead through several chance encounters. References are made to several taboo subjects of the time, but it's not as out and out salacious as might be expected from the title, but the film certainly winks at the audience a number of times as it hints at what's really on it's mind.