Cafe Hostess

When the film begins, there is a blurb announcing that the film is about Bar girls, or 'B-girls'...women who work in bars and encourage men to drink and spend their money. Soon the scene cuts to a clip joint run by Eddie where a variety of women of easy virtue work. Their job is to get the money out of the customers...and in some cases this means setting up guys with big wads to get rolled in the alley for their cash or lifting their wallets. An old timer at the club, Jo (Ann Dvorak), is getting sick of the life as well as Eddie's promises to marry her. Into this joint comes a nice guy, a sailor named Dan (Preston Foster). Do Dan and Jo stand a chance? It's unlikely since Eddie isn't the type to just let a girl go without a fight. To Eddie, they're his property.

While it's never said, I assume many viewers realize that in reality, these B-girls did tricks as well...though with the Production Code of 1934, such things could only be vaguely implied....and it's REALLY vague here. In fact, because of the subject matter many things are really vague in the film...such as the implication that Eddie is fooling around with one of the other B-girls. Still, in spite of this, the film is interesting and worth seeing....and awfully seedy for a Post-Code film.