parksycline
director dorothy arzner, one of two prominent female directors of this time, was a lesbian!!! she spent 40 years of her life with choreographer marion morgon!!!
with this in mind, i would say there is some delightful queercoding in this (particularly helen, who spends her run time studying and expressing her distaste in boys, though it's also blatant in bow's character, despite the entire film being about her relationship with a man). i also think that, despite many typical tropes, you can feel the woman's touch radiating from this (particularly in how the women interact, and how the school itself was built by a woman despite what people said of her).
dorothy arzner is credited as the inventor of the boom mic!!! she put a microphon...