Myra Breckinridge (1970)

Raquel Welch (looking breathtaking and showing some real acting chops as a transsexualvestite) and Mae West (hootworthy, singing songs and vamping with Tom Selleck) are the reasons to see Myra Breckinridge. A lot of other names show up as actors (John Huston, Farrah Fawcett, Rex Reed, John Carradine) and icons in black and white film clips (Judy Garland, Laurel & Hardy) and there's male rape, lesbian seduction, dirty medicine and a whole bunch more that, though interesting to see in a historical context, just doesn't add up to a good movie. What made the thing watchable is knowing that no major Hollywod studio would ever make a film like this again; it's a moment in time.

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...My Little Chickadee (1940)

Not as classic as I would've hoped, My Little Chickadee is almost two movies in one: Mae West tames her men while handling a six-shooter, and W.C. Fields drinks his hootch while playing cards. The two Hollywood icons are fine but the script doesn't necessarily use their specialties to best effect. Still and all, if you're interested in Hollywood history, this is a piece worth seeing once.

...Go West Young Man (1936)

Go West Young Man is a typical fish-out-of-water story with Mae West as Mavis Arden, a huge movie star who is forced to stay in a boarding house run by, of all people, Elizabeth Patterson (who looks as old -or young- as she did twenty years later when she played Mrs. Trumbull in I Love Lucy). Though not her best film, West does an admirable job teasing Randolph Scott and, ultimately, being tamed by the man you'd least suspect. Most interesting though are the scenes of Arden's film within the film, Drifting Lady, which gives a peak as to the actress West might've been had she not been an icon.

...Goin' To Town (1935)

Goin' To Town might be a knock-off of I'm No Angel (woman cashes in and attempts to move in on high society) but even a tame Mae West (this was made after the Production Code was more strictly enforced) is better than pretty much anything else. She throws off one-liners, sings the blues AND opera, walks that walk and beguiles all the men while pissing off all the gals. Goin' To Town is good enough that if your in to this gal...mmmm...you can't go wrong.

...I'm No Angel (1933)

Mae West was a one-of-a-kind jewel and I'm No Angel is her platinum setting - made thankfully before the Production Code was followed to it's full effect. Although at times the Cary Grant romance and its inevitable outcome reminded me of an extended episode of Love, American Style (forty years before the series was aired thank you very much), the film is not dated and the court room scene, with Mae doing her thing as her own lawyer, is hysterical. You'd be hard pressed to find a more unique actress and icon and a more apt film for her to display her...ahem...talents, all of them - she acts, sings, and wrote the screenplay.

...Night After Night (1932)

Gangsters, gun molls, a society girl, and a prim and proper political science professor encompass the surprisingly sweet and Runyon-esque story of the speakeasy at 55 Ninth Avenue in Night After Night. Mae West, in her film debut, sets the screen ablaze in the type of performance not previously seen by the movie-going public. Interestingly, this is one of the few films where West interacts with other actresses as a pal rather than a rival so those scenes (professor Alison Skipworth sharing a bed with West, for example), the...ah hem...relationship between George Raft and Roscoe Karns, and the quick shot of two lesbians passing a joint are the ones to watch for in this pre-code sizzler.