Eugenics and America have a weird, extensive history together, one that has been cast into the shadow's of history. Before the whole Hitler thing put the kibosh on selective breeding, sterilization for select individuals was supported and encouraged by both science and the American government. In researching legendary circus attraction Schlitzie the pinhead for my review of "Freaks", I discovered the 1934 picture "Tomorrow's Children" which deals with the then contemporary social issue head on. Directed by future "House of Wax", "He Walked By Night" and "Mysterious Island" screenwriter Crane Wilbur, it's a somewhat confused take on what is still an uncomfortable chapter in the American story.
Fresh faced couple Jim (Carlyle Moore Jr.) and Alice (Diane Sinclair) are young and in love. Jim has a bright future in the laundry business and is eager to get hitched. Nancy, though, is saddled with a terrible home life taking care of her irresponsible, alcoholic parent's and disabled brother's. The film gets off to a bleak start, with her drunken louse of a father (Arthur Wanzer) getting the news that his baby has been still born. "One less mouth to feed.", he replies.
The pathetic sadness continues when Nancy goes to see her mother (Sarah Padden). "Poor lucky little devil", her mother says, referring to the dead baby. Later as the doctor's discuss the incident, one of them expresses relief, saying, "Good thing, too. She already had a house full of idiot's and cripple's." This film is an incredible repository of callous, insensitive dialogue, especially when viewed through the cultural prism of the 21st Century. "...see, have I gotta sock ya to say yes?", is Jim's romantic marriage proposal to Alice, and unable to resist the charm of threatened physical abuse, the lucky little lady agrees.
Right on the heel's of this happy occasion, Nancy is hit by some really bad news, courtesy of a social worker waiting at her house. She's poor, and her family won't stop having kid's, so what does the government want to do? Why sterilize the whole clan, of course. Their reasoning is, "Most of the past three generation's have been feeble minded...each generation more of a problem..". Alice escapes from the house and hops a train where she is almost sexually assaulted by a hobo. She jumps off and gets a ride from a kindly man who turns out to be a sheriff (Dick Rush...great name). He delivers her to the very court she was trying to avoid in the first place. In one day Nancy's life has turned into a misogynistic Kafkaesque nightmare.
Inside the courtroom, Schlitzie stands before the judge (Frank LaRue), who sentences him to sterilization. Dressed in men's clothing and sporting a beard, it's incredible how normal the microcephalic freak show performer appears. The judge seems to pass the same sentence on every defendant who is brought before him: forced sterilization. Every defendant, that is, except the pervy creepo who moment's earlier, in a moment of pre-code titillation, ripped off a nurses clothing. He has a Senator representing him thanks to his daddy's political connection's, so the judge reverses his order.
Jim convinces Dr. Brooks (Donald Douglas) to argue Alice's case, but the judge will hear none of it. Nancy is condemned to sterilization. Brooks feels responsible for Nancy's situation and vows to help her. Throughout the picture, I kept viewing it as a dystopian, fascist alternate version of America and had to keep reminding myself that what's portrayed in the film isn't so far from the actuality of what was happening in the country at the time.
At the hospital Schlitzie is prepared for his procedure. Spike (Hyram A. Hoover), the other poor mope sentenced to the same fate, is scared they are going to chop off his manhood, but Dr. Brooks gives him an enthusiastic and detailed description of the operation that plays like an educational film put out by the vasectomy society. Here it becomes unclear what the film's stance is on the issue. Dr. Brooks, crusader of low income people's right to procreate, sure is gung ho about the idea when it comes to delinquent's like Spike and Schlitzie. So is this not so much an anti-eugenics picture as a eugenics reform picture? Is it an argument for the fair and just use of forced sterilization? I'm not sure.
Dr. Brooks tries unsuccessfully tries to convince his boss, Dr. McIntyre (W. Messenger Bellis...another great name) to spare Nancy, arguing that the poor are unfairly targeted and that eugenics would have robbed history of some it's greatest mind's. As the clock ticks closer to Nancy's surgery, Brooks rushes to her house in a last ditch effort to try and convince her mother to sign a form exonerating her.
"Tomorrow's Children" is a strange low budget relic of both Hollywood and America'a past. A sterilization thriller about the right's of the individual versus the cold logic of the system; Frank Capra by way of David Cronenberg. It's a message picture, but one so muddled it's unclear what exactly the message is.
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