Infernal Youth

 

That males run amok only teaches 

Young gals they're the pluck-worthy peaches

For when girls start aging

The men stop engaging

Old frail chicks must suck just like leeches.

At least that's the message of The Leech Woman (Edward Dein; 1960)

Red Dustup

One more tart in a skirt with a bust
Just a smart aleck flirt, lower crust
While you're tapping the rubber
You play sap and you snub her, 
Drag her heart through the dirt and the dust.

In Red Dust (Victor Fleming; 1932), Jean Harlow and Clark Gable spar on a rubber plantation.

Manhandle With Care

In the fight "Cagney versus Mae Clarke"
She might hurl a curse or remark
She'd nag and she'd glare
Then get dragged by her hair
His bite being worse than her bark.



James Cagney drags Mae Clarke out of bed and across the room -- by her hair: Lady Killer (Roy Del Ruth; 1933).

Mad Lover

She's his muse--or he's truly obsessed
He pursues her, and proves he's a pest
For his pick-up technique
Has a sick, twisted streak
And he'll lose, for such ghouls shes detest.

Frances Drake can't stand to look at Peter Lorre in Mad Love ( Karl Freund; 1935), based on the novel Les Mains D'Orlac (The Hands of Orlac) by Maurice Renard.

Her Parts Desire?

He was lonely and pined for mate
Someone sewn with more kindness than hate
But the parts-order lug
At her heartstrings won't tug
Muscles toned, but his mind doesn't rate.

Colin Clive, Elsa Lanchester, Boris Karloff and Ernest Theisinger in Bride of Frankenstein (James Whale, 1932).

Dr. Strange Love of Martha Ivers

When Martha is hitting on fellas
she's strange and a bit overzealous
To have and to hold them
she'll manage and mold them
like a bitch in the telenovelas

Kirk Douglas, Van Heflin and Barbara Stanwyck in The Strange love of Martha Ivers (Lewis Milestone, 1946). Image source: Silver Screen Oasis. A telenovela is a television serial novel popular in Latin America.

Arranged Love of Martha Ivers

It's early, but still you can tell
this couple will never end well
As bride and a groom,
their love-nest a tomb,
they're doomed to a marriage from hell

Child actors Mickey Kuhn and Janis Wilson grow up to be unhappy couple Kirk Douglas and Barbara Stanwyck in The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (Lewis Milestone, 1946). Read an earlier limerick on this uncivil union here.

Maltese Falcon Crest

The shamus named Samuel Spade
by dames didn't like to be played
It's a cinch this one's lying
and Sam isn't buying
There's a pinch, not a clinch, at the fade



Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor bring author Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade and Brigid O'Shaughnessy to life in The Maltese Falcon (John Huston, 1941). Please help the Film Noir Foundation in its efforts to preserve and promote film noir. Just go to their donation page.

Splash by Night

He's boiling and ready to bust
She's burning and set to combust
A duo in heat
they screw in deceit
Two fueled by a fiery lust



Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Ryan (above) torridly Clash by Night (Fritz Lang, 1952), where it isn't fire, but the violent sea which is used as a visual leitmotif. Clash is a romantic melodrama of infidelity. But is it a noir? There's no crime as such, but the threat of sexual violence hangs over the film. The script was based on a play by Clifford Odets. Ryan and other male characters refer to beating, whipping, strangling and cutting up women, and the young couple played by Marilyn Monroe and Paul Andes (below) play-fight and joke about violence throughout. If that isn't noir, who cares?

Trail of the Loathsome Pine

I loved her, she gave me the air
I call her, she's not ever there
We still go out walking
(the cops call it stalking):
I follow and give her a scare

Thanks to Backthrow for the title.

Wallace Dreary

What happened to old Wallace Beery
Did Wally commit hara-kiri?
What shortened his life?
His battle-ax wife?
It's called the Marie Dressler theory


Wallace Beery and Marie Dressler were partnered in several films. Top: Tugboat Annie (Mervyn LeRoy, 1933); Above: Min and Bill (George Hill, 1930).

Paradise Tossed

It's his side of heaven, not hers

And man wants what woman avers

What shes find to taste
the hes think is waste
Though lesbians each side prefers

Surly Knott

Wedding Bell Bruise

A puddle forms under the bed
a glistening stain, deepest red
Though vows they'd exchanged
they now were estranged
So much so, one also was dead

A Dame Inflamed

There's nothing like Woman when scorned
A Fury, with rage unadorned
Mere graphs cannot measure
this distaff displeasure
Don't say that you haven't been warned