First released in 1933, Damaged Lives is a prototypical example of the social issue exploitation film.  These were films that managed to escape the wrath of the censor by claiming to be an “educational” film that was specifically made to tell the public about a pressing social problem.  As a result, audiences could go to a movie like Damaged Lives and see all of the innuendo (and occasionally even a hint of forbidden nudity) that were censored out of mainstream films.  In return, the audience would have to spend five minutes or so listening to an authority figure talk about the dangers of juvenile delinquency, drug use, unplanned pregnancy, or venereal disease.

Damaged Lives deals with syphilis.  Young executive Donald Bradley (Lyman Williams) has been dating Joan (Diane Sinclair) for a long time but she is hesitant to get married.  This, despite the fact that she tells her best girlfriend that “I want a baby more than anything else in the world!” and, since this film is from 1933, good girls were apparently not allowed to have sex until getting married.

“Time for you two to get married!” another friend announces.

“What difference does it make?” Joan asks.

“A lot!” comes the reply.

“We should have been married a long time ago!” a bitter Donald exclaims.

Anyway, while waiting for Joan to finally be ready for marriage, Donald meets Elsie (Charlotte Merriam) and discovers that while good girls don’t have sex, bad girls do.  And they give you syphilis!  Unfortunately, Donald does not find out about the syphilis until after he and Joan have finally gotten married and Elsie has committed suicide.

What comes next?  Scandal, of course!  Suddenly, newsboys are screaming, “Extra!  Extra!” and everyone in town knows that Elsie had syphilis.  Donald doesn’t want to tell Joan that he slept with Elsie but then he’s taken on a tour through a hospital that’s full of people suffering from syphilis.  We’re told that the first two people who Donald meets are “innocent.”  They contracted syphilis accidentally, one by simply smoking a pipe after it had been used by an infected person.  Then Donald sees a man who is in the final stages of illness.

“He got it from a streetwalker!” a doctor barks out, “NOT SO INNOCENT!”

When Joan finds out that both she and Donald have been exposed and that she may have to wait to have a baby, she promptly makes plans to kill all of them…

It may not be obvious from the description above but Damaged Lives is actually rather subdued when compared to some other educational exploitation films.  This is no Reefer Madness.  In fact, the film’s final scenes — which involve Joan plotting a permanent end to her troubles — have a tragic sort of grandeur to them.  Damaged Lives is hardly an overlooked masterpiece but, as far as these type of films go, it’s not bad.

Interestingly enough, Damaged Lives was the first film to be directed by the legendary low-budget filmmaker Edgar G. Ulmer.  (Ulmer first came to Hollywood to work on F.W. Murnau’s Sunrise.)  Ulmer went on to direct such classic B-movies as The Black Cat, Detour, and The Man From Planet X.

You can watch Damaged Lives below!