Fortunately director Frank Lloyd does not disappoint with his 1933 Hoop-La which turned out to be Clara Bow's final film. She is wonderful. Her performance alone would make the film a must-see, but she receives excellent support from Minna Gombell, Herbert Mundin, Preston Foster, Richard Cromwell and the rest of the side-show folk. Lloyd's skillful direction is not confined to his players, but extends to his creation of atmosphere and realistic effects. Of course Lloyd had a big budget to play around with, and he uses it with both daring and sympathy. Admittedly, the background is no Nightmare Alley, but it's no Shirley Temple kiddie-land either. (Available on an 8/10 LostFlix DVD).

Clara was sure critics would dislike "Hoopla" as much as she did but she was wrong. By the time Paramount found a follow up vehicle to "Call Her Savage" twelve months had passed and Clara had lost the desire to work again but contractual obligations forced her to make one last film. An odd choice, Paramount went with "The Barker", a Broadway play starring Claudette Colbert that had already been made into a film with Betty Compson and Dorothy Mackaill. Clara didn't like her part as the tarty carnival dancer but if she rejected it she may have to wait another year for the studio to find something else. Critics loved it and found she had definitely matured as an actress. They also felt she photographed beautifully. Most actresses career's would be dead with a year between films but Clara, it was thought, was at the height of her power. But for Clara it was over and she was about to face her biggest challenge - motherhood and domesticity.Nifty Miller (Preston Foster) is in for a shock - his long, unseen son Chris (Richard Cromwell) has ridden the rails especially to catch up with his dad before the carnival opens in another town. Not everyone is happy to see him, his father wishes he had stayed on the farm and Nifty's mistress Carrie (Minna Gombell in another incisive portrayal) sees marriage to Nifty evaporate because of Chris's arrival."You mind your own business"!!! - "I ain't got the energy"!! Beautiful Lou (Bow) is the carnival vamp who leaves a trail of broken hearts in every town they play. Carrie is beside herself with jealousy and after a confrontation in a train (involving a gun!!) she convinces Lou (with the aid of $100) to trap Chris into a romance. Poor Clara, no wonder she felt jaded with the way the studios used her - her last film (although no one knew it at the time) and Fox still trotted out the obligatory "nude" bathing scene. The scene where Lou realises her feelings for Chris are genuine, her whole face has a transformation - Clara showed that she was still a forced to be reckoned with, within the acting world (even though no one, least of all Clara believed it)!!!The last scene bought tears to my eyes - Lou and Chris eventually marry, she forces him to return to his studies while she supports him doing an Egyptian dance at the Chicago World's Fair which proves sensational. Nifty reappears - his estrangement from Chris has hit him hard and he is down and out but Lou (unbeknownst to him) has arranged for him to be her "spieler" and the last shot is of the luminous Lou, Nifty realising everything she has done for Chris and finally able to give her all the accolades she deserves.Preston Foster was a superb, under-rated character actor who first came to attention when he recreated his Broadway role of Bud Clarke in the film version of "Two Seconds". Although only in his early thirties, with a bit of gray hair dye, he looked completely at home as Chris's father. Richard Cromwell was originally an artist whose series of masks bought him commissions from Joan Crawford, Bea Lillie and Greta Garbo. He was still only 20 and from there drifted into movies, usually playing fresh faced eager college kids ie "The Age of Consent" (1932) and "This Day and Age" (1933).

The extraordinarily fortuitous fact of being an existant does beguile and entrance us all into the illusion of a vibrant and eternal immortality. Thus Clara Bow in HOOPLA. Time illumines our vibrancy, then by a thousand surreptitious cuts does eventually slay each of us diminution by infinitesimal diminution. Thus did time to the irrepressible Clara Bow.

It's a tragedy that this should be Clara Bow's final film. She certainly had many years of good work ahead of her. She lights up the screen whenever she appears. She has wonderfully dramatic as well as comedic scenes here. Unfortunately, as much cannot be said about other cast members performances. Her final "snake hips" costume is the most revealing onscreen apparel of her career.