Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-1-2012

Publication Title

Film, Fashion & Consumption

Volume

1

Issue Number

3

First Page

305

Last Page

325

DOI

10.1386/ffc.1.3.305_1

Disciplines

Film and Media Studies | Radio | Television

Abstract

In this article, I analyse the function of Art Deco designs in the 1930s gangster genre and, in particular, Warner Brothers' Marked Woman (Bacon, 1937). Like many gangster films of the period, it associates high-style Art Deco with excess and the criminal underworld. My findings, however, reveal a tension between the film's moralist stance and its visual excess. Compelling visual signifiers of leisure, style and social mobility, the modern designs are free to circumvent the film's critical message and reinforce American capitalist ideologies. My analyses underscore Art Deco as an emblematic style of commercial modernity. Marked Woman and other gangster films not only reflect the latest trends in design, but also negotiate a constellation of values, ideologies and desires at a time of social and economic volatility.

Comments

Copyright © 2012 Intellect, Ltd.. The published version of the article can be found online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1386/ffc.1.3.305_1.

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