Cheap Red Salute (Video) (Barbara Stanwyck, Robert Young) (Sidney Lanfield) Price

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Customer Reviews of Red Salute

DRUE VAN ALLEN.
Stanwyck plays the above character in a rather untypical role: that of a happy college girl who gets romantically involved with the now-forgotten Hardie Albright - who has been seduced by Communist propaganda.... Because of its anti-Communist theme, RED SALUTE was so notorious in 1935 that it occasioned a riot by leftist students when it opened at New York's Rivoli Theatre. More than 150 students demonstrated with many being arrested. Constance Cummings was originally to play the Stanwyck role in this variation of the IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT theme. Without the anti-red preaching, it would have been a pretty decent comedy: it was re-released as RUNAWAY DAUGHTER with some cutting of the controversial theme, and was shown on TV entitled HER ENLISTED MAN (!).

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A little film with big results.
RED SALUTE is a screwball comedy about the runaway daughter of an army general and her meeting with a soldier down Mexico way. It stars Barabara Stanwyck and Robert Young. The film is well acted, solidly directed with some nice action/chase scenes. Yet it is a minor screwballer at best, not particulary funny at all with a weak script. Certainly worth seeing yet not great. The most fascinating thing about Red Salute is it's somewhat anticommunist theme. Stanwyck's boyfriend is a communist agitator working for the Soviet Union and the film does not approve. Yet it's anti-red message is really not very strong. This is a screwball comedy after all. The form does not really allow for long digressions on social/political/historical theory. And, like Nazism, Communism does need to be explained. NINOCHKA has the same problem. Consequently, RED SALUTE's anticomminism is about as hard as a soap bubble. Yet this film resulted in liberal riots and theaters being firebombed upon it's release. This is the film that Hal Wallis of Warner Bros was referring to when he nixed an anticommunist film the studio was planning in the early Forties, remarking that the reds would only bomb the theaters. This film, because of the violent liberal reaction, kowtowed the studios so that freedom of expression in regards to making films about the communist menace was effectivley destroyed until the late forties. This film. This little film that so enraged the liberals. Amazing.

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An Amazing example of liberal censorship
When Red Salute was released in 1935, the theaters playing it were bombed and the liberals rioted. The effect; freedom of speech was stifled in this country concerning any attempt to make films about the Communist menace. It was this film, for example, that Hal Wallis of Warner Bros was referring to when he put a stop to a propossed anticommunist comedy in the early forties, citing that the communists would probably smoke bomb the theaters. The amazing thing? Red Salute is a screwball comedy! And it is not that good a screwball comedy at that. It's a good film to be sure. The action sequences are very well done. It is well acted. It is just not that funny. And, as a anticommunist film, it is not that effective. To be an effective anti anything, one must first explain it and communism, like Nazism, takes some explaining and Red Salute is a scewball comedy. The genre really doesn't allow for long historical political explications. Though, the film does make the point the communism is a fraud that no mature thinking person could ever embrace. But it is a mild point. As hard as a soap bubble. Yet, because of this film, there were riots and censorship for years. This little insignificant movie. Makes one wonder what liberals mean when they talk about freedom of speech.