Delayed Reaction: The Outlaw

The Pitch: Jane Russell has a bosom.

Something something Doc Holliday. Something something Billy the Kid. Something something, Jane Russell.

One of the ways that I build my list of movies to watch is that I try to find one movie from every episode of the podcast You Must Remember This I listen to. That's where the Outlaw pick came from I don't remember if they spent an entire episode on the making of The Outlaw, but it sure felt like it. The movie was shot in 1941 but it didn't get released fully until 1946. And, when it was released, it become a hit. I know those were different times, but can you imagine that happening now? A movie getting delayed five years and still being a hit. I remember Margaret was pretty delayed. Cabin in the Woods got delayed 3 years because of financial difficulties MGM was having. Despite being released in China in 2010, the widely panned political thriller Shanghai wasn't released in the US until 2015. David O Russell kept his movie Accidental Love buried for almost 7 years before it finally got a release. I can't think of any [financial] success stories among recent films that sat this long though*. Then again, the Hays Code makes the MPAA look like Sodom and/or Gamorrah.

*Cabin in the Woods is the closest I can find. It made $42 million and the budget probably wasn't crazy. I have a hard time calling the 80th highest grossing movie of the year a "hit" though.

The crazy thing about The Outlaw is how much it's about Jane Russell's bosom, despite it not being even remotely a plot point. Director Howard Hughes became obsessed with designing a bra that would amplify Russell's bosom on screen. The bra was essentially a torture device. She wore it for only a few minutes then lied about wearing it for almost the entirety of filming. Hughes ended up battling with the Hays office to get a releasable cut of the movie, all because of Jane Russell's bosom. The movie got released for only a week before censors pulled it because of indecency. Hughes helped to fan the flames of protesters against the film as a way to build public curiosity. This worked so well, people were so curious about Jane Russell, that they made it a hit five years later, when it finally got released. That's insane, if for no other reason because the scandalous bosom wouldn't even register as shocking now if it was in God's Not Dead 4: Electric Boogaloo.

This is not a very good or interesting movie. Everything good about it is in the story of how it got made and released. I guess Jane Russell is striking enough. There's no reason to bother seeing the movie though.

Verdict (?): Strongly Don't Recommend