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Baby Face (1933) is one of the sleazier pre-Code films. It stars Barbara Stanwyck as Lily Powers, a young woman with more than her share of hard knocks. A speakeasy waitress in Erie, Pennsylvania, Lily divides her time between fighting off the advances of the customers and turning tricks at her father/pimp's behest. She seems to look forward only to visits from Mr. Cragg, a Nietzsche-quoting cobbler who exhorts her to "use men, not let them use you!"
After her father dies in a still explosion, Lily finally heeds Cragg's advice. She and Chico, her black friend/maid, run off to Gotham, New York, where Lily proceeds to sleep her way up to the top of a bank, eventually becoming a kept woman. Hearts are broken, etc., etc.
Tropes used in Baby Face include:
- Black Best Friend: "If Chico goes, I go!"
- Calling the Old Man Out: See Freudian Excuse below
- Everybody Smokes: Well, it was the 1930s, what do you expect?
- Freudian Excuse: "Yeah, I'm a tramp, and who's to blame! My father! Ever since I was 14, what's it been? Nothing but men! Dirty, rotten men! And you're lower than any of them!"
- Gold Digger: Lily
- The Ingenue / The Vamp: A main part of Lily's method of seduction is alternating and blurring the lines between the two.
- Office Lady: Lily, when she's not digging for gold
- Salt and Pepper: Lily and Chico
- Sex Equals Love: Subverted. The men Lily seduces are always surprised to find that she doesn't buy into this worldview and therefore has no problem chucking them once they've outlived their usefulness.
- The Stoic: Lily