WHEN BUTTERFLIES CRY

This is what it looks like when marriages die.

Today in 1965 the low budget drama Scream of the Butterfly premiered for U.S. audiences. The poster is simple but provocative, which is a fitting assessment of the movie as well. Its central development is a murder that occurs when a couple marries, only for the wife to embark on an affair five days after the wedding, and later be run down by a car. Viewers learn this as a district attorney and his assistant district attorney disagree over the best way to conduct a murder prosecution. The boss wants it done quietly, while the assistant wants a showy trial that generates plenty of publicity, thus the possible opportunity for self-promotion. They both vie against a confident public defender who believes he has an ironclad temporary insanity defense. The three spend the film in the D.A.’s office arguing their respective points of view, while the murder’s circumstances are related via episodic flashbacks.

Argentinian dancer Nélida Lobato stars as the highly sexed victim, her husband is portrayed by William Turner, and the legal eagles are Nick Novarro, Richard Beebe, and Robert Miller. None of this crew can act but the movie is watchable anyway because it possesses an interesting earnestness, exemplified by its tragic soundtrack and artsy tight framing meant to project high melodrama. Also, notably, Lobato shows everything that could be legally shown on a screen in 1965, so the movie has a bit of significance on that front. But on the whole, it’s too poorly put together to be called an actual success, even with its undeniably clever twist ending. At one point, bit player Alan J. Smith laments, “This is like a bad play,” as if he’s making a nostra culpa to the audience. Scream of the Butterfly isn’t like a bad play. It’s like a high-minded but ultimately mediocre play.

Argentina, Scream of the Butterfly, Nélida Lobato, Nick Novarro, Richard Beebe, Robert Miller, poster art, cinema, sexploitation, lgbt, movie review

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

February 16

1937—Carothers Patents Nylon

Wallace H. Carothers, an American chemist, inventor and the leader of organic chemistry at DuPont Corporation, receives a patent for a silk substitute fabric called nylon. Carothers was a depressive who for years carried a cyanide capsule on a watch chain in case he wanted to commit suicide, but his genius helped produce other polymers such as neoprene and polyester. He eventually did take cyanideâ€”not in pill form, but dissolved in lemon juiceâ€”resulting in his death in late 1937.

February 15

1933—Franklin Roosevelt Survives Assassination Attempt

In Miami, Florida, Giuseppe Zangara attempts to shoot President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, but is restrained by a crowd and, in the course of firing five wild shots, hits five people, including Chicago, Illinois Mayor Anton J. Cermak, who dies of his wounds three weeks later. Zangara is quickly tried and sentenced to eighty years in jail for attempted murder, but is later convicted of murder when Cermak dies. Zangara is sentenced to death and executed in Florida’s electric chair.

February 14

1929—Seven Men Shot Dead in Chicago

Seven people, six of them gangster rivals of Al Capone’s South Side gang, are machine gunned to death in Chicago, Illinois, in an event that would become known as the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. Because two of the shooters were dressed as police officers, it was initially thought that police might have been responsible, but an investigation soon proved the killings were gang related. The slaughter exceeded anything yet seen in the United States at that time.

February 13

1935—Jury Finds Hauptmann Guilty

A jury in Flemington, New Jersey finds Bruno Hauptmann guilty of the 1932 kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby, the son of Charles Lindbergh. Hauptmann is sentenced to death and executed in 1936. For decades, his widow Anna fights to have his named cleared, claiming that Hauptmann did not commit the crime, and was instead a victim of prosecutorial misconduct, but her claims are ultimately dismissed in 1984 after the U.S. Supreme Court refuses to address the case.