joshh76 Review of Diary of a Lost Girl

Diary of a Lost Girl (1929)

An excellent film with one of Louise Brooks best performances

[10/10 · 18 October 2006]

The comments submitted are from Josh76's Dad, Dan47 I found this film to be deeply moving. Louise Brooks portrays the innocent Thymiane with such pathos that I wanted to reach out to the screen and rescue her. Unlike most films from this period there is no rescue in "the nick of time". Events follow an inexorable nightmare pattern as Thymiane, the victim, is condemned to imprisonment after being raped and impregnated by her father's employer. Abandoned financially and emotionally by her selfish father she can only fall into prostitution after she escapes the home for wayward girls. I couldn't help being reminded of "The Magdalene Sisters", another film where girls are blamed for the lustful acts of their attackers and seducers. Louise Brooks expresses more with her eyes then most actors do with paragraphs of dialogue. Even during the giddiest parties in the brothel she expresses desperation, despair and regret with rare subtlety. Despite its' age and the lack of sound the film stands up well. The presentation is not overly sentimentalized, though the enduring "goodness" of the Thymiane and her eventual "redemption" might stretch the imagination. In an age where "human trafficking" is running rampant we could use an actress of such beauty, charisma, and sympathy to portray the continuing plight of girls and women driven into the sordid life of prostitution.