Precode's Defense Of Honor

Seducer Done In For Seducing in Unashamed (1932)

Score One for the "unwritten law," Topic A of this precode declaration that a brother may rightly dispatch whatever bounder soils a sister's honor. Call it William S. Hart in modern dress, issues and resolution a same as when treated in silent westerns by venerable Bill. Some aspects of morality had not changed despite many that had, this courtroom-explained by Lewis Stone as defense counsel for likeable Robert Young, who plugged Monroe Owsley for being, well, Monroe Owsley. Soiled dove is Helen Twelvetrees, she a variation on Norma Shearer rich girls gone trampy in better precodes (A Free Soul, Strangers May Kiss), but even Norma's weren't as blunt to say cads have it coming from gunpoint of aggrieved family (A Free Soul does however let fiancee Leslie Howard kill for Shearer honor). Most of action revolves around a witness chair after the fatal shot is fired, thus action confined to bravura of Lewis Stone and John Miljan as courtroom opponents, their speeches way left of reality's field, but corkers the same for unleash of views widely held re justifiable homicide. Femme lead Twelvetrees was mostly at RKO service; I'd assume Metro borrowed her for this, maybe after Shearer, Crawford et al turned Unashamed down?