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She Shoulda Said 'No'!
Wild Weed / Marijuana, the Devil's Weed / The Story of Lila Leeds and Her Exposé of the Marijuana Racket
USA 1949
produced by Richard Kay for Roadshow Attractions
directed by Sam Newfield (as Sherman Scott)
starring Lila Leeds, Alan Baxter, Lyle Talbot, Mary Ellen Popel, David Holt, Michael Whalen, Doug Blackley (= Robert Kent), Don C. Harvey, Jack Elam, David Gorcey, Dick Cogan, Rudolf Friml jr, Knox Manning (voice), Henry Corden
story by Arthur Hoerl, screenplay by Richard H. Landau, music by Raoul Kraushaar, theremin effects by Samuel Hoffman
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Markey (Alan Baxter) is a dope peddler as slick as they come, and as
such kingpin Jonathan Treanor's (Michael Whalen) best man. And as such, he
supplies among others the dancing girls of Hugo's (Henry Corden) with
weed. And when he pays another visit to the club, his eyes fall on
beautiful and virtuous Anne (Lila Leeds), and he knows he wants her pretty
much on the spot, so he persuades her colleague Rita (Mary Ellen Popel) to
throw a party with Anne invited where they can persuade her to do some
weed. Of course they succeed, and the party gets wild, and before you know
it, Anne is hooked - and also madly in love with Markey. Doing all the
weed they do, Anne and Rita's dancing soon deteriorates - to the point
where Hugo throws them out. Anne's desparate as she needs the money to get
her brother Bob (David Holt) through college - so it's easy for Markey to
persuade her to throw pot parties at her house, with her getting a cut of
the dope they sell. But then Bob walks into one of these parties, is
shocked how his sister makes her money, and promptly hangs himself. Anne
is of course shocked when she finds Bob's dead body, and that only drives
her deeper into addiction. Meanwhile, police captain Hayes (Lyle Talbot)
reads about the suicide in a newspaper and figures it has to do with
marihuana, so he has his men shadow her - and they soon stumble upon
Markey. Hayes insists on Markey not being arrested so he can lead them to
his boss - but to get Anne out of trouble, they have her arrested, then
give her a tour of what happens to weed addicts (in a scene weirdly
reminiscent of Dickens' A
Christmas Carol) to try to get her to give away Markey's boss,
but she won't squeal. However, her 60 days in the slammer break her as
she's forced to deal with her brother's death, so out again she meets up
with Markey and claims she has a big buyer, and they should both discuss
this with Jonathan Treanor. Treanor bites the bait, and so one of Hayes'
men (Doug Blackley) pretends to be the big buyer - and this way the police
is able to shake up the whole gang. And Anne promises to have learned her
lesson and be a good girl hereafter ... ... only in real life,
Lila Leeds didn't. Prior to She Shoulda Said 'No'!, Lila Leeds was
basically a bit player on the rise to maybe-stardom, but then she and
Robert Mitchum, then already hot stuff but not yet the superstar he would
become, got busted for marihuana possession and were given 60 days in jail
each. It was said that neither would work in Hollywood ever again, and yet
Mitchum's career sky-rocketed after - while for Lila Leeds, She Shoulda
Said 'No'!, a film pretending to be made with public welfare in mind,
but really to exploit her reputation for a quick buck, would remain her
only starring role, and she left Hollywood soon afterward and was
according to reports a drug addict most of her life. All of
which says very little about the film itself, which is a pretty routine
cautionary tale about the horrors of doing drugs that's very much
on-the-nose, lacks any kind of subtlety, and seems to be based on popular
opinion much more than research on the subject - which is of course
perfectly in line with other drug-related movies from the era, most of
which use the drug-angle to draw in the audience and the moral angle to
keep the censor at bay. But taking the lack of subtlety out of the
equation, this is a movie that's actually enjoyable in a B-movie sort of
way, it's moving along swiftly and has plenty going on to keep one
interested. And Alan Baxter sure makes a good slimey villain, while Lila
Leeds might not be great but more than adequate for this type of film.
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