Hula (film)

Hula
Directed by	Victor Fleming
Produced by	Adolph Zukor; Jesse L. Lasky; B. P. Schulberg; (associate producer)
Written by	Doris Anderson (adaptation); Ethel Doherty (scenario); George Marion, Jr. (titles); Frederica Sagor (uncredited)
Based on	Hula, a Romance of Hawaii; by Armine von Tempski
Starring	Clara Bow; Clive Brook; Arlette Marchal; Albert Gran
Cinematography	William Marshall
Edited by	E. Lloyd Sheldon; Eda Warren
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date	August 27, 1927;
Running time	64 minutes
Country	United States
Language	Silent (English intertitles)

Hula is a 1927 American silent romantic comedy film directed by Victor Fleming, and based on the novel Hula, a Romance of Hawaii by Armine von Tempski. The film stars Clara Bow and was released by Paramount Pictures.[1]

Plot

Hula Calhoun (Clara Bow) is the daughter of a Hawaiian planter, Bill Calhoun (Albert Gran). She follows the advice of her uncle Edwin (Agostino Borgato), and follows a simple and natural life, far from social conventions of her family and is considered a "wild child" who wears pants and rides horses.[2]

Courted with adoration by Harry Dehan (Arnold Kent), Hula prefers a young British engineer, Anthony Haldane (Clive Brook), who came to the island to oversee the construction of a dam on her father's property. However, Haldane is already married. At a party, Haldane tries to keep his distance but Hula gets drunk and performs a seductive hula dance for him. She manages to provoke him so much that he promises that he will get a divorce. When his wife, Margaret (Patricia Dupont), appears, Hula makes a deal with one of the foreman to use dynamite to blow up a point on the dam. Thinking that her husband is now ruined, Mrs. Haldane agrees to the divorce, and the two lovers can finally get married.

Cast

Clara Bow as Hula Calhoun
Clive Brook as Anthony Haldane
Arlette Marchal as Mrs. Bane
Albert Gran as Bill Calhoun
Arnold Kent as Harry Dehan
Patricia Dupont as Margaret Haldane
Agostino Borgato as Uncle Edwin
Duke Kahanamoku as Hawaiian boy

Production

Bow in a famous scene from the film

In the opening scene of the film Hula is shown swimming nude in a stream, and later is wearing pants and articulates her sexual desires.[2] Similar to Sadie Thompson (1928), the film depicts a modern woman who is located outside the bounds of American civilization and thus able to act in an "uncivilized" manner like natives who live on the islands.[3][4]

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References

Progressive Silent Film List: Hula at silentera.com
Fischer, Lucy (2003). Designing Women: Cinema, Art Deco, and the Female Form. Columbia University Press. pp. 174–76. ISBN 0-231-12501-1.
Schlater, Angela (December 2008). Flaming Youth: Gender in 1920s Hollywood. Ann Arbor, Michigan: ProQuest. pp. 91–93. ISBN 0-549-94439-7.
Wood, Houston (1999). Displacing Natives: The Rhetorical Production of Hawaiʻi. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 104–05. ISBN 0-8476-9141-1.

External links

Hula on IMDb
Hula at AllMovie
Stills at the Walter Film Poster and Film Museum

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[1] Progressive Silent Film List: Hula at silentera.com

[Fischer-2] Fischer, Lucy (2003). Designing Women: Cinema, Art Deco, and the Female Form. Columbia University Press. pp. 174–76. ISBN 0-231-12501-1.

[3] Schlater, Angela (December 2008). Flaming Youth: Gender in 1920s Hollywood. Ann Arbor, Michigan: ProQuest. pp. 91–93. ISBN 0-549-94439-7.

[4] Wood, Houston (1999). Displacing Natives: The Rhetorical Production of Hawaiʻi. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 104–05. ISBN 0-8476-9141-1.