MovieChat Forums > The Lost Weekend Discussion > What kind of girl, exactly, was Gloria?

What kind of girl, exactly, was Gloria?

posted 20 years ago by slumlord7
18 replies | jump to latest

I am trying to figure out exactly what kind of girl Gloria was supposed to be. I realize movies in those days spoke in a kind of code (ie...couple lying before a fire meant they have just made love) and I wondered if they were trying to telepgraph that she was a prostitute of some kind.

OR...was she just a "good time gal" who flitted around from man to man? She clearly fancied Milland's character. (One of my favorite lines: "oh, NATCH, Gloria...NATCH!" as he rushed away to buy booze with the money she gave him).

I suspect the former, but don't want to impose the viewpoint of our times on this WWII era movie.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] Tavish_McDonell 20 years ago

She is a prostitute but this could not be dealt with openly without Gloria's punishment and conversion becoming the focus of the movie. Hence the "code" you refer to. The Hays censorship office saw prostitution as a crime, like murder, which could not be carried on with scot free. Nat's bar is the kind of unpretentious watering hole that might have a "live-in" hooker; she has appointments there to meet men she doesn't know--arranged by the pimp she calls her "friend"--and to "show them a good time in New York."

Unusually for films of this period, Gloria has some personality and her affection for Don seems to be genuine.

[–] 80334080 20 years ago

I think your answer is a good one but I would add one thing. In those days the line between a prostitute and a good time girl wasn't so clear cut as it is now. If you remember early in the movie Gloria turns down a guy who is looking for "a good time" because she liked Don and hoped to have a date with him. No true professional would turn down a paying customer-then or now! I think she takes pay for sex only to the extent necessary to pay for the basics and the rest of the time she leads a normal life.

[–] jescci 20 years ago

That line you speak of may have been further obscured five or six years before the film's release at the height of the depression during which time I assume the novel's author experienced the events depicted.

What say there, Fuzzy Britches? Feel like talking?

[–] shutterstop 19 years ago

staying with that scene when she turned down the john in the bar to go on a date with Don...she would have rather gone with Don than the John cause she was in love with Don and no amount of money could have come between her and her love for Don..then theres the scene that concretes the fact that she was turning tricks...Its when Don goes to her to get money after he stands her up to bing on booze and she states that she gave up a client to go on a date with Don...shes mad at him but still loves him and thats why she gives him the money...to bad Don couldn't make it down the stairs

[–] zygimantas 19 years ago

no doubts about it, you guys are right - but there is something about women in movies from this time.. I watched "Stage Door" recently and the Lucille Ball character in that was always going out to dinner with embarrassing guys, okay she liked one of the guys I think, but there was an undercurrent in there somewhere that indicated women saw men literally as a meal ticket, i.e. - a "date" is the same thing as a meal, and when you're hungry you go out with a man just so you know where your next meal is coming from. The discussion about the depression-era mentality is fitting, women at that time who hadn't typing skills or didn't want to work their fingers to the bone had one of two dreams: get famous or marry a guy who could take care of them. Women like Gloria who hung out in bars might have been simply short-terming it, looking for the free drinks and free meals that a flirtatious girl could get by being "nice" to men.

So I'm just throwing this in there for something to think about, not saying she's not a prostitute, just saying she mightn't be all that different from a lot of girls, and the choices weren't all that wide-open.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] shutterstop 19 years ago

so you were alive then and know how people acted in the early part of the 20th cen. cause ive heard other storys then the uptight versions that movies and tv would like you to belive...

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] ShellOilJunior 18 years ago

Well, Doris Dowling (Gloria) was Wilder's misttress at the time and that's how she got in the movie according to Conversations with Wilder...

[–] infinity8 9 years ago

Agreed. Gloria is a working girl, which is made clear when a man whom she has never met comes in to look for her. A regular "good time girl" could pick up a date anywhere she met. She wouldn't need men to be referred to her. Obviously, it was not very "professional" for Gloria to turn down the john, but prostitutes are people, too. Just because someone sells sex doesn't mean that they can't fall in love or turn down the occasional client if they dislike him. Gloria and Don have obviously been flirting for quite some time, she is in love with him, and as the bartender points out, it is terribly cruel of Don to make a date with Gloria when he's never going to keep it. It's heartbreaking that Gloria wants to go to the salon before having a date with Don. She doesn't care about looking that good for any of her customers, but Don is special.

[–] princesstinymeat 16 years ago

She a ho.

[–] 16 years ago

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[–] Blondfashionisto 14 years ago

I wondered about her apartment - Why there were so many buzzers outside of her door (or was it just another hallway...? Someone seemed to call for her from inside the apartment as Ray Milland was walking away...

Thoughts anyone?

‘Six inches is perfectly adequate; more is vulgar!' (Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Re: An open window).

[–] brendanchenowith 14 years ago

She was the prototype of the white-trash crack whore we all know and love today.

Personally, I think she was a mentally retarded hooker and I wanted to slap her.

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked.

[–] AssetsonFire 12 years ago

She was whatever kind of girl you wanted her to be, Mr.

~.~
I WANT THE TRUTH! http://www.imdb.com/list/ze4EduNaQ-s/

[–] NewtonFigg 11 years ago

There is a type of young woman who has, perhaps, a bit of trouble making ends meet on the pay from her daytime job and supplements her income with a little "light hooking". She always keeps her eyes open for Mr. Right who will sweep her off her feet and into respectability. Like Gloria, she may not go out looking for any John, but waits until someone she trusts refers someone to her who gives her a call. Hence the name call girl. In real life, Nat would have been getting something for letting Gloria use his place. He took a chance that someone might report Gloria's presence to the cops and he could lose his license. The idea that he would take such a risk just out of altruism defies logic.

[–] 9 years ago

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