Girl 27 (2007)

User Rating:

6.2/10   

Director:

David Stenn

Writer:

David Stenn (writer)

Release Date:

27 July 2007 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary

Plot:

The reclusive Patricia Douglas comes out of hiding to discuss the 1937 MGM scandal, in which the powerful film studio tricked her and over 100 other underage girls into attending a stag party, where she was raped. |

Plot Keywords:

Underage | Mother Daughter Relationship | Newspaper Headline | Sexism | Character Assassination

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Baby Peggy	...	Herself (as Peggy Montgomery)
Richard Bann	...	Himself
Kelly Brown	...	Himself
Ned Comstock	...	Himself
Joan Crawford	...	Herself (archive footage)
Patricia Douglas	...	Herself
Buron Fitts	...	Himself (archive footage)
Clark Gable	...	Himself (archive footage)
Jean Harlow	...	Herself (archive footage)
Judy Lewis	...	Herself
E.J. Mannix	...	Himself (archive footage)
Louis B. Mayer	...	Himself (archive footage)
Judd D. Minter	...	Himself (as Judd Minter)
Patti Minter	...	Herself
Norma Shearer	...	Herself (archive footage)
David Stenn	...	Himself
Michael Taitelman	...	Himself
Jack Terry	...	Himself
Greta Van Susteren	...	Herself

Runtime:

USA:86 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White | Color

Company:

TLR Productions

Trivia:

If you freeze shots of the hand-written call sheet early in the film, some names of the other extras can be found on the IMDb. They include Eleanor Bayley (5), likely Amber Norman (17), Nancy Deshon (24), Ruth Day (26), Ginger Wyatt (29), Darleen Hackley (aka Darlyn Heckley, 33), Vivian Mason (54), Patsy Perrin (59), Sue Gomes (80), Nancy Page (83), Peggy Campbell (86, probably Jean Stevens), Collette Merton (96), and Thelma Joel (97).

Movie Connections:

Features Night World (1932)

Soundtrack:

Blues in the Groove

David Stenn, Boy #1

What self-respecting documentary filmmaker would appear on camera to quote his book editor (Jacqueline Onassis): "She said, 'if anyone can tell this story, you can, David.'") or go in for the close-up to feature a testimonial from his subject ("Thank God for him")? It's an obnoxious way to, respectively, begin and end, a potentially compelling documentary about an incredibly brave woman.

The first half is a rather sloppily edited view of Hollywood in the 1930s with a lot of misguided film clips used to illustrate the worst of celebrity and power (and a lot of footage of director Stenn pacing and fretting and worrying and sitting with every tangential revelation cued with ominous music). The hotel room scene in which Steen anxiously awaits his first face-to-face meeting with Patricia Douglas is embarrassing. So is the admission that he offered to scrub out her toilets to get her to talk. It's important for her, of course. A catharsis, he says. You can't help but feel that Douglas is being exploited all over again so Stenn can get an "exlcusive" for his lip-smacking tabloid story.

When Douglas, as well as her family, are finally allowed to speak for themselves in the second half, it becomes a more focused and moving look at the subject herself, and the life-long ramifications of sexual assault. But Stenn can't help but to throw himself in at the end again, as savior, when he includes Douglas saying, "They should make a documentary about him."

Well, he has.