Hula (film)

1927 film

For other uses, see Hula (disambiguation).

Hula

Directed by| Victor Fleming
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
Produced by| Adolph Zukor
Jesse L. Lasky
B. P. Schulberg
(associate producer)
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 (1927-08-27)

Running time

| 64 minutes
Country| United States
Language| Silent (English intertitles)
Full film

Hula is a 1927 American silent romantic comedy film directed by Victor Fleming, and based on the novel Hula, a Romance of Hawaii (1927) by Armine von Tempski. The film stars Clara Bow and was released by Paramount Pictures.[1] The film entered into the public domain on January 1, 2023, because regardless of the film itself's renewal status, the copyright of the book it was based on was renewed in 1954.[2]

## Plot

[edit]

Hula, 1927 lantern slide

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.[3]

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

[edit]

* 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

[edit]

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.[3] 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.[4][5]

## See also

[edit]

* Nudity in film
* The White Flower (1923)

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Progressive Silent Film List: Hula at silentera.com
2. ^ "Hula; a romance of Hawaii".
3. ^ a b Fischer, Lucy (2003). Designing Women: Cinema, Art Deco, and the Female Form. Columbia University Press. pp. 174–76. ISBN 0-231-12501-1.
4. ^ Schlater, Angela (December 2008). Flaming Youth: Gender in 1920s Hollywood. Ann Arbor, Michigan. pp. 91–93. ISBN 978-0-549-94439-3.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
5. ^ Wood, Houston (1999). Displacing Natives: The Rhetorical Production of Hawaiʻi. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 104–05. ISBN 0-8476-9141-1.

## External links

[edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Hula (film).

* Hula at IMDb
* Synopsis at AllMovie
* Stills Archived March 3, 2016, at the Wayback Machine at the Walter Film Poster and Film Museum
* Still at silentfilmstillarchive.com

* v
* t
* e

Films directed by Victor Fleming

* When the Clouds Roll By (1919)
* The Mollycoddle (1920)
* Mama's Affair (1921)
* Woman's Place (1921)
* The Lane That Had No Turning (1922)
* Red Hot Romance (1922)
* Anna Ascends (1922)
* Dark Secrets (1923)
* Law of the Lawless (1923)
* To the Last Man (1923)
* The Call of the Canyon (1923)
* Code of the Sea (1924)
* Empty Hands (1924)
* The Devil's Cargo (1925)
* Adventure (1925)
* A Son of His Father (1925)
* Lord Jim (1925)
* The Blind Goddess (1926)
* Mantrap (1926)
* The Way of All Flesh (1927)
* Hula (1927)
* The Rough Riders (1927)
* Abie's Irish Rose (1928)
* The Awakening (1928)
* Wolf Song (1929)
* The Virginian (1929)
* Common Clay (1930)
* Renegades (1930)
* Around the World in 80 Minutes with Douglas Fairbanks (1931)
* The Wet Parade (1932)
* Red Dust (1932)
* The White Sister (1933)
* Bombshell (1933)
* Treasure Island (1934)
* Reckless (1935)
* The Farmer Takes a Wife (1935)
* Captains Courageous (1937)
* Test Pilot (1938)
* The Wizard of Oz (1939)
* Gone with the Wind (1939)
* Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941)
* Tortilla Flat (1942)
* A Guy Named Joe (1943)
* Adventure (1946)
* Joan of Arc (1948)

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template