Fast-Talking Dames

This book discusses the role of women in film, particularly those women from the earlier years of film that were fast-talking and smart. This is a great record of how film tried to sneak intelligent women into their movies, even though society at the time dictated that women should be docile and silent.A great analysis of women and their roles in United States history.

Maria DiBattista, in Fast-Talking Dames, looks at the women (Jean Harlow, Carole Lombard, Ginger Rogers, Myrna Loy, Jean Arthur, Claudette Colbert, Katharine Hepburn, Irene Dunne, Rosalind Russell, Barbara Stanwyck, and, even, Great Garbo) who helped create a new woman, a dame as it were, in screen comedy in the late thirties until the mid-forties. This woman relied on her voice for her wit and her power and the author does a very good job of looking at the effect and originality of this voice in the beginning of the book. The text can veer into over-analyzing at times, particulary in the chapters devoted to just one movie, but that is part of the charm of a film studies book. It will make one look a little longer and lot more carefully at these comic screen gems in the future. Anyone interested in screwball comedy will enjoy this book whether they agree with all the conclusions or not. The text may get a little bogged with a heavy scholar's hand but the material being studied always helps the lighten the load. An interesting addition to film studies books.