Mom and Dad
Encyclopedia
Mom and Dad is a feature-length 1945 film directed by William Beaudine
, and largely produced by the exploitation film
maker and presenter Kroger Babb
. Mom and Dad is considered the most successful film within its genre
of "sex hygiene" films. Although it faced numerous legal challenges, and was condemned by the National Legion of Decency
, it went on to become one of the highest-grossing films of the 1940s.
Mom and Dad starred Hardie Albright
. It is regarded as an exploitation film, a term used to describe repackaged films with a controversial content, sometimes including medical footage, designed to establish an educational value that might circumvent U.S. censorship
laws.
Babb's marketing of his film incorporated old-style medicine show
techniques, and used unique promotions to build an audience. These formed a template for his later works, which were imitated by his contemporary filmmakers. In 2005, the film was added to the United States National Film Registry
, in recognition of its numerous achievements.
—his production company Cox and Underwood
disbanded, forcing him to form his own unit, Hygienic Productions
. Having attended a meeting in Burkburnett, Texas
, that discussed the alleged impregnations of young women by G.I.s from nearby Sheppard Air Force Base
, Babb was inspired to shoot a film based on the subject. His future wife Mildred Horn
drafted a screenplay which later evolved into Mom and Dad. Babb located 20 investors willing to fund the movie, and hired William Beaudine
as director.
Production of the film cost Babb and his investors a total of $63,000. The movie was shot in five separate studios over six days in 1944, and was spread across various Monogram Pictures
lots; co-producer J. S. Jossey
was a Monogram stockholder. On January 3, 1945, Mom and Dad premiered at the Warner Bros.
theatre in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
.
The plot is padded with a large amount of filler
. Films of this type were usually produced quickly and at minimal cost, and while filler was sometimes used to increase the production value, the usual motivation was to extend its running time to qualify for feature length
status. Eric Schaefer
notes that the "primary purpose" of the plot of Mom and Dad was to "serve as the vehicle onto which the spectacle of the clinical reels can be grafted", such as the live birth scene. The marketing materials suggest the latter reason also, and many posters for the film promised that "You [will] actually SEE the birth of a baby!" The dialogue is carefully worded, and uses period euphemisms rather than explicit terms that may have been controversial at the time. In particular, at no time does the film specifically mention sexual intercourse
or pregnancy
.
" from her mother Sarah Blake (Lois Austin); however, the mother refuses because the girl is not yet married. The girl later learns from her father Dan Blake (George Eldredge) that the pilot has died in a crash. She tears up a letter she had been writing to him, and lowers her head as the film fades into intermission.
The film resumes at the point when the girl discovers that her clothes no longer fit, sending her into a state of despair. She takes advice from her teacher, Carl Blackburn (Hardie Albright), who had previously been fired for teaching sex education. Blackburn blames her mother for the problem, and accuses her of "neglect[ing] the sacred duty of telling their children the real truth." Only then is the girl able to confront her mother.
The film then presents reels and charts which include graphic images of the female anatomy, and footage of live births - one natural and one Caesarian. In some screenings, a second film was shown along with Mom and Dad, and contained images portraying syphilis
and venereal disease. Mom and Dad is believed to have had a number of endings, although most typically concluded with the birth of the girl's child, sometimes stillborn
and other times put up for adoption.
The official credits also acknowledge The Four Liphams as well as the California
State Champion dancers of the jitterbug.
article covering Babb's career, the film critic Kenneth Turan
wrote that Mom and Dad did not "flourish because of its birth footage or because of its puerile plot, which Babb himself disparages . . . [its] success flowed, rather, from Babb's extraordinary promotional abilities." The film was exhibited across the United States, and over 300 prints were produced. In the weeks preceding the screening, local presenters sought to attract the attention of the town's inhabitants by distributing letters to local newspapers and church leaflets protesting against the film's moral basis. This strategy often utilized fabricated letters supposedly written by the mayor of a nearby city, who wished to register concern about local young women in his area who had seen the film and were awakened enough to discuss problems similar to their own.
The campaigns were usually orchestrated by employees of either Hygienic or Hallmark Productions, and they nominally based their campaign from information provided by a standard and detailed pressbook
containing cast and crew information, as well as other promotional
and marketing materials. Babb's marketing strategy centered on overwhelming small towns with advertisements and letters, in an attempt to create a controversial atmosphere. In keeping with his motto of "You gotta tell 'em to sell 'em," the film became so ubiquitous that Time
wrote that its presentation "left only the livestock unaware of the chance to learn the facts of life."
The local pitch included a variety of limited screenings, including adults-only showings, viewings segregated by gender, and a live lecture by the "Fearless Hygiene Commentator Elliot Forbes" which was often placed during the intermission. At any one time, a number of "Elliot Forbes"es would give simultaneous talks in a number of locations showing the film. In some predominantly African-American areas, Olympic gold medal
ist Jesse Owens
was hired to make appearances instead of an actor playing Forbes. The "Elliot Forbes" actors were usually people local to the production company, sometimes out-of-work performers. Along with "Forbes", presentations were often held with "nurses" in attendance, ostensibly in the event that someone fainted due to the content of the film; such "nurses" were often hired locally.
Modern Film Distributors
later distributed the film, and sold over forty-five thousand copies of the books Man and Boy and Woman and Girl following Forbes's lecture. The text was written by Babb's wife, and was filled with both biological and sexual education materials relevant to the film's subject matter; generating extra profit items for their distributors. The sales of these books netted an estimated $31,000 for the distribution company, while Babb estimated the total sales for all distributions at 40 million copies.
Babb insisted that the program be followed closely; a contractual agreement with theaters required that each presentation follow a similar approach. Because the Forbes lecture formed part of the viewing, extra newsreel
s or short films were not permitted, although previews were allowed. A contractual agreement disallowed matinée pricing, set specific times for the segregated viewings, and prohibited the screening of the film on Sundays.
estimates that the film grossed between $40 million and $100 million, and it has been cited as the most successful sex hygiene film ever released. It remains the most profitable pre-1960 exploitation film; ranking among the top ten grossing films of both the 1940s and 1950s, even when scaled against those year's mainstream releases.
The film was at the center of many high profile lawsuits and condemnations. The exploitation genre was pitched against numerous challenges during the 1940s and 1950s, and fought many local censorship battles, and fought bitterly against the motion picture censorship system
. It has been claimed that nearly 428 lawsuits were laid against both Babb and Mom and Dad during the film's run. Babb often used the supposed educational value of his films as an offer of defense, and recommended such tactic to theater owners in his pressbooks. One successful challenge was in New York City, where Mom and Dad remained censored until 1956, when the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court overturned the ruling of the censorship board, deciding that human birth did not qualify as "indecent".
According to Modern Film Distributors, as of the end of 1956, the film has been dubbed into a dozen languages and attended by an estimated worldwide attendance figure of over 175 million people, at over 650,000 performances. Card Mondor
purchased the rights to exhibit the film in New Zealand and Australia during the mid-1960s, almost twenty years after the film's debut. In the late 1970s, a story on Babb by the Press-Enterprise estimated that the film had been dubbed into 18 languages.
The film's success spawned a number of imitators, who sought to saturate the market with genre imitations. In particular, Street Corner recycled Babb's plot, substituting a concerned physician
for a concerned teacher. In 1948, Universal
produced a similar film, The Story of Bob and Sally, but was unable to screen it due to the production code
, and eventually sold the rights. The volume of imitations led to the formation of Modern Film Distributors, a group of exploitation filmmakers, in an effort to minimize booking conflicts.
In 1969, the film was submitted to the Motion Picture Association of America
for a film rating, in order to allow the film be shown in traditional movie theaters; it received an R rating. The movie was such a success that it is still shown decades later around the world. In 2005, a version was added to the National Film Registry.
William Beaudine
William Beaudine was an American film actor and director. He was one of Hollywood's most prolific directors, turning out films in remarkable numbers and in a wide variety of genres.-Early life and career:...
, and largely produced by the exploitation film
Exploitation film
Exploitation film is a type of film that is promoted by "exploiting" often lurid subject matter. The term "exploitation" is common in film marketing, used for all types of films to mean promotion or advertising. These films then need something to exploit, such as a big star, special effects, sex,...
maker and presenter Kroger Babb
Kroger Babb
Howard W. "Kroger" Babb was an American film and television producer and showman. His marketing techniques were similar to a travelling salesman's, with roots in the medicine-show tradition...
. Mom and Dad is considered the most successful film within its genre
Genre
Genre , Greek: genos, γένος) is the term for any category of literature or other forms of art or culture, e.g. music, and in general, any type of discourse, whether written or spoken, audial or visual, based on some set of stylistic criteria. Genres are formed by conventions that change over time...
of "sex hygiene" films. Although it faced numerous legal challenges, and was condemned by the National Legion of Decency
National Legion of Decency
The National Legion of Decency was an organization dedicated to identifying and combating objectionable content, from the point of view of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, in motion pictures...
, it went on to become one of the highest-grossing films of the 1940s.
Mom and Dad starred Hardie Albright
Hardie Albright
Hardie Albright was an American actor and the son of travelling vaudevillians.Born as Hardie Hunter Albrecht, he made his stage debut in one of his parents' acts at the age of 7....
. It is regarded as an exploitation film, a term used to describe repackaged films with a controversial content, sometimes including medical footage, designed to establish an educational value that might circumvent U.S. censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
laws.
Babb's marketing of his film incorporated old-style medicine show
Medicine show
Medicine shows were traveling horse and wagon teams which peddled "miracle cure" medications and other products between various entertainment acts. Their precise origins unknown, medicine shows were common in the 19th century United States...
techniques, and used unique promotions to build an audience. These formed a template for his later works, which were imitated by his contemporary filmmakers. In 2005, the film was added to the United States National Film Registry
National Film Registry
The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...
, in recognition of its numerous achievements.
Production
Despite the commercially successful run of Babb's debut film, Dust to Dust—a reworked version of the 1938 film Child BrideChild Bride
Child Bride, also known as Child Brides , is a 1938 film directed by Harry Revier. Set in a remote town in the Ozarks, it claims to be an attempt to draw attention to the lack of laws banning child marriage in many states...
—his production company Cox and Underwood
Cox and Underwood
Cox and Underwood was the name of an exploitation film travelling road show and production company from the 1930s run by Howard Russell Cox and Howard Underwood...
disbanded, forcing him to form his own unit, Hygienic Productions
Hygienic Productions
Hygienic Productions was a film production company based out of Wilmington, Ohio. Formed by exploitation film producer Kroger Babb, the company was in charge of promotion and production for a number of Babb's films, including the infamous Mom and Dad....
. Having attended a meeting in Burkburnett, Texas
Burkburnett, Texas
Burkburnett is a city in Wichita County, Texas, United States. It is part of the Wichita Falls, Texas Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 10,927 at the 2000 census. The community's newspaper is the Burkburnett Informer/Star...
, that discussed the alleged impregnations of young women by G.I.s from nearby Sheppard Air Force Base
Sheppard Air Force Base
Sheppard Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located five miles north of the central business district of Wichita Falls, in Wichita County, Texas, United States. It is the largest training base and most diversified in Air Education and Training Command...
, Babb was inspired to shoot a film based on the subject. His future wife Mildred Horn
Mildred Horn
Mildred Horn was a film critic and screenwriter, best known for her work on the Kroger Babb exploitation film Mom and Dad.Horn was born in Erie, Pennsylvania and studied at Academy High School...
drafted a screenplay which later evolved into Mom and Dad. Babb located 20 investors willing to fund the movie, and hired William Beaudine
William Beaudine
William Beaudine was an American film actor and director. He was one of Hollywood's most prolific directors, turning out films in remarkable numbers and in a wide variety of genres.-Early life and career:...
as director.
Production of the film cost Babb and his investors a total of $63,000. The movie was shot in five separate studios over six days in 1944, and was spread across various Monogram Pictures
Monogram Pictures
Monogram Pictures Corporation is a Hollywood studio that produced and released films, most on low budgets, between 1931 and 1953, when the firm completed a transition to the name Allied Artists Pictures Corporation. Monogram is considered a leader among the smaller studios sometimes referred to...
lots; co-producer J. S. Jossey
J. S. Jossey
Jack S. Jossey was an American film producer and businessman. A Seagram stockholder, he helped finance and film many exploitation films during the 1940s, including Mom and Dad and The Prince of Peace.-References:...
was a Monogram stockholder. On January 3, 1945, Mom and Dad premiered at the Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
theatre in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City is the capital and the largest city in the state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 31st among United States cities in population. The city's population, from the 2010 census, was 579,999, with a metro-area population of 1,252,987 . In 2010, the Oklahoma...
.
The plot is padded with a large amount of filler
Filler (media)
In media, filler is material that is combined with material of greater relevance or quality to "fill out" a certain volume.-Early television:...
. Films of this type were usually produced quickly and at minimal cost, and while filler was sometimes used to increase the production value, the usual motivation was to extend its running time to qualify for feature length
Feature film
In the film industry, a feature film is a film production made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie...
status. Eric Schaefer
Eric Schaefer
Eric Schaefer, Ph.D., is a professor and film historian. He is an associate professor at Emerson College and interim chair of the visual and media arts department. He has a B.A. from Webster University, and an M.A. and Ph.D...
notes that the "primary purpose" of the plot of Mom and Dad was to "serve as the vehicle onto which the spectacle of the clinical reels can be grafted", such as the live birth scene. The marketing materials suggest the latter reason also, and many posters for the film promised that "You [will] actually SEE the birth of a baby!" The dialogue is carefully worded, and uses period euphemisms rather than explicit terms that may have been controversial at the time. In particular, at no time does the film specifically mention sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse, also known as copulation or coitus, commonly refers to the act in which a male's penis enters a female's vagina for the purposes of sexual pleasure or reproduction. The entities may be of opposite sexes, or they may be hermaphroditic, as is the case with snails...
or pregnancy
Pregnancy
Pregnancy refers to the fertilization and development of one or more offspring, known as a fetus or embryo, in a woman's uterus. In a pregnancy, there can be multiple gestations, as in the case of twins or triplets...
.
Plot
Mom and Dad tells the story of Joan Blake (June Carlson), a young girl who falls for the pilot Jack Griffin (Bob Lowell). After being sweet talked by Griffin, she has sex with him. The girl requests "hygiene booksSocial hygiene
The social or mental hygiene movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries was an attempt by Progressive-era reformers to control venereal disease, regulate prostitution and vice, and disseminate sexual education through the use of scientific research methods and modern media techniques.The...
" from her mother Sarah Blake (Lois Austin); however, the mother refuses because the girl is not yet married. The girl later learns from her father Dan Blake (George Eldredge) that the pilot has died in a crash. She tears up a letter she had been writing to him, and lowers her head as the film fades into intermission.
The film resumes at the point when the girl discovers that her clothes no longer fit, sending her into a state of despair. She takes advice from her teacher, Carl Blackburn (Hardie Albright), who had previously been fired for teaching sex education. Blackburn blames her mother for the problem, and accuses her of "neglect[ing] the sacred duty of telling their children the real truth." Only then is the girl able to confront her mother.
The film then presents reels and charts which include graphic images of the female anatomy, and footage of live births - one natural and one Caesarian. In some screenings, a second film was shown along with Mom and Dad, and contained images portraying syphilis
Syphilis
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the spirochete bacterium Treponema pallidum subspecies pallidum. The primary route of transmission is through sexual contact; however, it may also be transmitted from mother to fetus during pregnancy or at birth, resulting in congenital syphilis...
and venereal disease. Mom and Dad is believed to have had a number of endings, although most typically concluded with the birth of the girl's child, sometimes stillborn
Stillbirth
A stillbirth occurs when a fetus has died in the uterus. The Australian definition specifies that fetal death is termed a stillbirth after 20 weeks gestation or the fetus weighs more than . Once the fetus has died the mother still has contractions and remains undelivered. The term is often used in...
and other times put up for adoption.
Cast
- Hardie AlbrightHardie AlbrightHardie Albright was an American actor and the son of travelling vaudevillians.Born as Hardie Hunter Albrecht, he made his stage debut in one of his parents' acts at the age of 7....
– Carl Blackburn, the teacher. - Lois AustinLois AustinLois Austin was an American actress, who had a number of film and television roles to her credit, including The Amos 'n Andy Show as "Harriett Harrington". She was also documented in the series You Are There in 1955.-External links:*...
– Sarah Blake, the mother. - George EldredgeGeorge EldredgeGeorge Eldredge was an American character actor. Although he never became a major performer, Eldredge played in over 180 movies during a career that stretched from the 1930s to the early 1960s. He also had a prolific television career during the '50's...
– Dan Blake, the father. - June Carlson – Joan Blake, the teen-age girl.
- Jimmy Clark – Joan's brother.
- Bob Lowell – Jack Griffin, the pilot.
- Jane IsbellJane IsbellJane Isbell was a minor actress, a bit player and extra who appeared in some major films produced during Hollywood's Golden Era in the 1930s-40s....
– Mary Lou, Joan's friend. - Jimmy Zaner – Allen Curtis, Joan's hometown boyfriend.
- Robert Filmer – Superintendent McMann.
- Willa Pearl Curtis – Junella, the Blake family's African-American maid.
- Virginia Van – Virginia, Dave's girlfriend.
- Forrest Taylor – Dr. Ashley, the obstetrician.
- Jack Roper – The coach.
The official credits also acknowledge The Four Liphams as well as the California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
State Champion dancers of the jitterbug.
Marketing and presentation
In a Washington PostThe Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
article covering Babb's career, the film critic Kenneth Turan
Kenneth Turan
Kenneth Turan is an American film critic and Lecturer in the Master of Professional Writing Program at the University of Southern California.-Background:...
wrote that Mom and Dad did not "flourish because of its birth footage or because of its puerile plot, which Babb himself disparages . . . [its] success flowed, rather, from Babb's extraordinary promotional abilities." The film was exhibited across the United States, and over 300 prints were produced. In the weeks preceding the screening, local presenters sought to attract the attention of the town's inhabitants by distributing letters to local newspapers and church leaflets protesting against the film's moral basis. This strategy often utilized fabricated letters supposedly written by the mayor of a nearby city, who wished to register concern about local young women in his area who had seen the film and were awakened enough to discuss problems similar to their own.
The campaigns were usually orchestrated by employees of either Hygienic or Hallmark Productions, and they nominally based their campaign from information provided by a standard and detailed pressbook
Pressbook
In cinema a pressbook may be a piece of promotional material created and distributed by film producers in order to market their films. Prior to 1980, most film companies did their own promotion, and the pressbooks would be given to exhibitors....
containing cast and crew information, as well as other promotional
Promotion (marketing)
Promotion is one of the four elements of marketing mix . It is the communication link between sellers and buyers for the purpose of influencing, informing, or persuading a potential buyer's purchasing decision....
and marketing materials. Babb's marketing strategy centered on overwhelming small towns with advertisements and letters, in an attempt to create a controversial atmosphere. In keeping with his motto of "You gotta tell 'em to sell 'em," the film became so ubiquitous that Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
wrote that its presentation "left only the livestock unaware of the chance to learn the facts of life."
The local pitch included a variety of limited screenings, including adults-only showings, viewings segregated by gender, and a live lecture by the "Fearless Hygiene Commentator Elliot Forbes" which was often placed during the intermission. At any one time, a number of "Elliot Forbes"es would give simultaneous talks in a number of locations showing the film. In some predominantly African-American areas, Olympic gold medal
Gold medal
A gold medal is typically the medal awarded for highest achievement in a non-military field. Its name derives from the use of at least a fraction of gold in form of plating or alloying in its manufacture...
ist Jesse Owens
Jesse Owens
James Cleveland "Jesse" Owens was an American track and field athlete who specialized in the sprints and the long jump. He participated in the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany, where he achieved international fame by winning four gold medals: one each in the 100 meters, the 200 meters, the...
was hired to make appearances instead of an actor playing Forbes. The "Elliot Forbes" actors were usually people local to the production company, sometimes out-of-work performers. Along with "Forbes", presentations were often held with "nurses" in attendance, ostensibly in the event that someone fainted due to the content of the film; such "nurses" were often hired locally.
Modern Film Distributors
Modern Film Distributors
Modern Film Distributors was the name of a film distribution organization cartel formed by filmmakers in the 1940s. Following the success of the exploitation film Mom and Dad, the four leading presenters of the time agreed to work together to book each others' films in...
later distributed the film, and sold over forty-five thousand copies of the books Man and Boy and Woman and Girl following Forbes's lecture. The text was written by Babb's wife, and was filled with both biological and sexual education materials relevant to the film's subject matter; generating extra profit items for their distributors. The sales of these books netted an estimated $31,000 for the distribution company, while Babb estimated the total sales for all distributions at 40 million copies.
Babb insisted that the program be followed closely; a contractual agreement with theaters required that each presentation follow a similar approach. Because the Forbes lecture formed part of the viewing, extra newsreel
Newsreel
A newsreel was a form of short documentary film prevalent in the first half of the 20th century, regularly released in a public presentation place and containing filmed news stories and items of topical interest. It was a source of news, current affairs and entertainment for millions of moviegoers...
s or short films were not permitted, although previews were allowed. A contractual agreement disallowed matinée pricing, set specific times for the segregated viewings, and prohibited the screening of the film on Sundays.
Reception
It is claimed that Mom and Dad is the third highest grossing film of the 1940s in dollar value, and returned close to $63 for each dollar invested by its backers. The Los Angeles TimesLos Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
estimates that the film grossed between $40 million and $100 million, and it has been cited as the most successful sex hygiene film ever released. It remains the most profitable pre-1960 exploitation film; ranking among the top ten grossing films of both the 1940s and 1950s, even when scaled against those year's mainstream releases.
The film was at the center of many high profile lawsuits and condemnations. The exploitation genre was pitched against numerous challenges during the 1940s and 1950s, and fought many local censorship battles, and fought bitterly against the motion picture censorship system
Production Code
The Motion Picture Production Code was the set of industry moral censorship guidelines that governed the production of the vast majority of United States motion pictures released by major studios from 1930 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the Hays Code, after Hollywood's chief censor of the...
. It has been claimed that nearly 428 lawsuits were laid against both Babb and Mom and Dad during the film's run. Babb often used the supposed educational value of his films as an offer of defense, and recommended such tactic to theater owners in his pressbooks. One successful challenge was in New York City, where Mom and Dad remained censored until 1956, when the Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court overturned the ruling of the censorship board, deciding that human birth did not qualify as "indecent".
According to Modern Film Distributors, as of the end of 1956, the film has been dubbed into a dozen languages and attended by an estimated worldwide attendance figure of over 175 million people, at over 650,000 performances. Card Mondor
Card Mondor
Card Mondor was an Australian magician and stage performer. A one time assistant for the Great Virgil , he gained fame as a performer in the United States, most notably for entertaining troops during World War II. He was featured on the cover of Genii in April 1947...
purchased the rights to exhibit the film in New Zealand and Australia during the mid-1960s, almost twenty years after the film's debut. In the late 1970s, a story on Babb by the Press-Enterprise estimated that the film had been dubbed into 18 languages.
The film's success spawned a number of imitators, who sought to saturate the market with genre imitations. In particular, Street Corner recycled Babb's plot, substituting a concerned physician
Physician
A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...
for a concerned teacher. In 1948, Universal
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
produced a similar film, The Story of Bob and Sally, but was unable to screen it due to the production code
Production Code
The Motion Picture Production Code was the set of industry moral censorship guidelines that governed the production of the vast majority of United States motion pictures released by major studios from 1930 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the Hays Code, after Hollywood's chief censor of the...
, and eventually sold the rights. The volume of imitations led to the formation of Modern Film Distributors, a group of exploitation filmmakers, in an effort to minimize booking conflicts.
In 1969, the film was submitted to the Motion Picture Association of America
Motion Picture Association of America
The Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. , originally the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America , was founded in 1922 and is designed to advance the business interests of its members...
for a film rating, in order to allow the film be shown in traditional movie theaters; it received an R rating. The movie was such a success that it is still shown decades later around the world. In 2005, a version was added to the National Film Registry.