Panther Woman of the Needle Trades or The Lovely Life of Little Lisa (1931)

The photographer Ralph Steiner who had been making abstract avantgarde films in the late 1920s contributed his own parody of American economic life with PANTHER WOMAN OF THE NEEDLE TRADES OR THE LOVELY LIFE OF LITTLE LISA 1931 The film which opens with Jehovah Morris Carnovsky creating the world out of a test tube proceeds to present a short history of the universe before the birth of Elizabeth Hawes 1903 the heroine of the films title It then follows her career from childhood seamstress to Parisian designer of haute couture via a college education at Vassar Reminiscent of Robert Floreys THE LIFE AND DEATH OF 9413A HOLLYWOOD EXTRA 1928 in terms of its art direction and elliptical narrative style PANTHER WOMAN is a parody of the allAmerican success story a young womans fantasy of a glamorous career in an age of diminishing possibilities via httpencyclopediajrankorgarticlespages2902AvantGardeFilmhtml