Note to TCM: "Gay" = gay men AND lesbians

Well Calamity Jane has got to be in there, obviously.

According to The Celluloid Closet, Lauren Bacall's character in Young Man With A Horn was meant to be a lesbian... although I haven't seen the movie, so I can't say how clearly that comes across.

Isn't there some movie with Hepburn called Sylvia Scarlet where she has to disguise herself as a boy for some reason?

There's both version of The Children's Hour (if you want something depressing... and subtextual or textual, depending which version you watch).

Am I the only one to find Jo in the 1949 (colour) film of Little Women rather lesbianish? I know Hepburn played the part in an earlier black-and-white version (which I haven't seen), so I can well imagine there may be some subtext in that one too.

it uses practicaly every single cliché in order to indicate that Capucine's character is a lesbian without actually saying it. I mean, she's French, and lived in New York, and is an artist, and is a prostitute.

Um... wow. I hadn't actually realised that any of those things is meant to indicate that someone is a lesbian! Being French? Doesn't that include a rather large number of women?

...and I nominate The Haunting ('63). Not only is it a fantastic haunted house movie, but there's plenty of lesbian subtext that it's thisclose to simply being overt text. Reading the film as a parable about sexual repression isn't difficult.

It's absolutely one of my favorite films, more than partially because Claire Bloom is such a gorgeous predatory-but-in-a-sexy-way-not-a-psycho-way lez. :) Hubba hubba!

i am an avid watcher of TCM, so i am pretty darn excited for this! :-D

Totally agree that Claire Bloom is really hot in The Haunting. 

But I think Calamity Jane is one of the most lesbionic movies of all time.  It's like the Brokeback Mountain of its time.  Think about it: Two people of the same sex attempting to make house in the wilderness but ultimately end up with other people (only it has to be a happy ending in Jane because it's a musical). 

Even more lesbian about it: A butch and a femme living together and singing about a "Secret Love" and how "A Woman's Touch" is like magic.  TOTALLY GAY!!!

1931's "Madchen in Uniform".  1954's "Johnny Guitar" with Joan Crawford and Mercedes McCambridge.

And for pure camp, throw in "The Violent Years", Ed Wood's 1950's classic of "leather-jacketed deliquent devil dolls. Spoiled rich debutantes form a girl gang; they rob gas stations, rape rich guys and strip down "goody" girls".

StageDoor from 1937stars Katherine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers, Lucille Ball an tells the story of a group of actresses living in a boarding house in New York.

Need i say more...

It is a fantastic and very witty film.

In "All About Eve", Anne Baxter's single white female routine that she was pulling on Bette Davies was subtext and then some!

Lots of very unsubtle nods to lesbianism in this film. Example:

BILL
Need any help?

MARGO(Bette Davies)
(pauses, smiles)
To put me to bed? Take my clothes
off, hold my head, tuck me in, turn
off the lights, tiptoe out...? Eve
would. Wouldn't you, Eve?

EVE(Anne Baxter)
If you'd like.

That movie was completely dykeadelic :)

Totally agree with spotticus on "Johnny Guitar". I can't remember anything from that movie except for Mercedes McCambridge making a lot of "I wanna f*** you" eyes at Joan Crawford.

The exclusion of women, though often typical in these types of salutes or retrospectives, may actually have something to do with TCM's limited library.  Because so many of their films are from MGM, they might not have rights to air some of the RKO and Warner Bros. pics mentioned above.  That said, I'm sure they could have found at least a couple of films that inlcuded lesbian (or alluded-to-lesbian) characters.  I salute them for even going this far on the topic of homosexual themes in film.

Marlene Dietrich is my absolute favorite, Morocco is fabulous. She worked the suit.

How about the first movie to EVER have a lesbian character, Pandora's Box (1929). Excellent silent film with the sexy Louise Brooks, where she ruins everyone who loves her, including a countess.

Its a must-see, along with "The Children's Hour". I love classic subtexty cinema!! ^_^

I am soooo gonna do a movie marathon with all these Lez Classics...

oh what an idea! I'm gonna ring my friends right now! :D

(ps- yes ppl, Mary's still alive :P)

A Florida Enchantment (1914), Manslaughter (1922), Dracula's Daughter (1936), Rebecca (1940), Young Man With A Horn (1950), All About Eve (1950), Caged (1950)

Mercedes McCambridge is always a bull-dyke type character, ie. - Johnny Guitar (1954), Giant (1956), Touch of Evil (1958)

Screaming Mimi (1958), The Goddess (1958), The Children's Hour (1962), Walk on the Wild Side (1962) 

And of course I could go on, but the Production Code becomes obsolete, and therefore innuendo becomes less subtext and more in your face (though generally not in the most accurate or flattering of ways).  Nevertheless, there is much to say about the lesbian in classic Hollywood films.  I should know.  I just finished a 60 page thesis on it