Kings row

Kings Row was well ahead of its time, anticipating fifties melodramas such as “Peyton Place” and those of Sirk, Minnelli et al., in its subversive view of small town America. The scriptwriter Casey Robinson takes most of the credit for managing to win the approval of Production Code officials during the repressive Breen and post-Breen years. Incest in the novel is thinly disguised in the film as hereditary insanity. Leg amputation is virtually synonymous with castration. The American doctor-fathers are middle class monsters while positive values are inverted almost exclusively in European immigrants and the working class. Religion rates no mention in a world clearly polarised between good and evil. The young people’s struggle to overcome obstacles is heightened to the point of self parody as melodrama of triumph. Visual design was mainly the work of William Cameron Menzies (who storyboarded the whole film) and cinematographer James Wong Howe. From the novel by Henry Bellamann. Cast includes: Ann Sheridan, Robert Cummings, Ronald Reagan, Betty Field, Charles Coburn.