Pre-Code crime films

The era of American film production from the early sound era to the enforcement of the Hays Code in 1934 is denoted as Pre-Code Hollywood. The era contained violence and crime in pictures which would not be seen again until decades later. Although the Hays office had specifically recommended removing profanity, the drug trade, and prostitution from pictures, it had never officially recommended against depictions of violence in any form in the 1920s. State censor boards, however, created their own guidelines, and New York in particular developed a list of violent material which had to be removed for a picture to be shown in the state. Two main types of crime films were released during the period: the gangster picture and the prison film. A triumvirate of gangster pictures were released in the early 1930s—Little Caesar (1931), The Public Enemy (1931), and Scarface (1932)—which were built on the template created by the first gangster movie, 1927's Underworld. All featured the rise and eventual fall of an organized criminal. As described by crime film scholar Jack Shadoian the maxim became, "If the films insist that one can't win, under that given it's how you lose that counts." Scarface was the most controversial and violent; the film took nearly a year to reach theaters due to battles with censors. Obviously based on the life of Al Capone, Scarface and others like it outraged civic leaders who felt that movies were glorifying the lifestyles of criminals. Stirred into action by the 1930 Ohio penitentiary fire, which resulted in 300 deaths when guards refused to let inmates out of their cells, Hollywood produced movies which depicted the harsh conditions in prisons at the time. The prototype of the prison genre was 1930's The Big House. The picture features future genre staples such as solitary confinement, informers, riots, an escape, and the codes of prison life. Never box office hits, prison pictures failed to attract the female audiences they needed to achieve financial success. Chain gang films were produced in a similar response to the callous inhumanity of the chain gang system which was prevalent among states in the southern US. The 1932 film I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang is considered the seminal movie of the genre, and was based on the autobiography of Robert E. Burns who was himself a fugitive at the time of the picture's release.

Early crime films

In the early 1900s America was still primarily a rural country, especially in terms of self-identity. D. W. Griffith's 1912 film The Musketeers of Pig Alley is one of the earliest American films to feature urban organized crime. Prohibition's arrival in 1920 created an environment where anyone who wanted to drink had to interact with criminals, especially in urban areas. Nonetheless, the urban crime genre was ignored until 1927 when the film Underworld, which is recognized as the first gangster movie, became a surprise hit. According to the Encyclopedia of Hollywood's entry on Underworld, "The film established the fundamental elements of the gangster movie: a hoodlum hero; ominous, night-shrouded city streets; floozies; and a blazing finale in which the cops cut down the protagonist." Other gangster films such as Thunderbolt, Lights of New York, The Racket, and The Doorway to Hell were released to capitalize on Underworld's popularity, with Thunderbolt later described as "a virtual remake" of the film. Motivated by financial gain in an increasingly competitive film market, and motivated by the fact that provocative pictures sold tickets, these movies pushed the boundaries of film violence. Other late 1920s crime films depicted organized crime on Broadway, and investigated the connection between mobsters and Broadway productions in films such as 1929's Tenderloin and Broadway. The Hays Office had never recommended banning violence in any form in the 1920s—unlike profanity, the drug trade or prostitution—but advised that it be dealt with carefully. New York's censor board was the most active board of any state, reviewing around all but 50 of the country's 1,000–1,300 annual releases. In 1927–8 the violent scenes they most removed were all instances where the gun was pointed at the camera, some instances where guns were pointed "at or into the body of another character", many shots where machine guns were featured, scenes where criminals shot at law enforcement officers, some scenes involving stabbing or knife brandishing (stabbings were considered more disturbing than shootings by audiences), most whippings, several involving choking, torture, or electrocution, and scenes which could be considered educational in their depiction of crime methods. Sadistic violence, and reaction shots showing the faces of individuals on the receiving end of violence were considered especially sensitive areas. The Code later recommended against scenes showing "robbery", "theft", "safe-cracking", "arson", "the use of firearms", "dynamiting of trains, machines, and buildings", and "brutal killings" on the basis that they would be rejected by local censors.

Westerns Justus D. Barnes starred as "Bronco Billy Anderson", leader of an outlaw gang from the silent film, The Great Train Robbery (1903), the first "Western" ever filmed. The Western was a subgenre of crime films. Scenes where criminals aimed guns at the camera were considered inappropriate by many state censor boards in the pre-Code and Code era, and were removed from public viewing.

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