6. Unmarried Mothers - Women Of Twilight (1951/1952)
A 1951 play by Sylvia Rayman and a 1952 film directed by Gordon Parry, Women of Twilight dealt with the then thorny topic of babies born out of wedlock. Helen - an evil unscrupulous woman is running a baby farm which consists of unmarried mothers, either pregnant or have just given birth and the squalor they live in. Vivianne, one of the unfortunate girls, stands up to Helen and gives her what for. Requiring cuts to language (such as "You rotten little b**tards" to "You rotten little brats") in order to secure an X certificate in Britain, Women of Twilight may have been stagey and melodramatic, but it did highlight the social plight of a very vulnerable and ostracised group in society - namely unwed mothers. This stigma of having babies out of wedlock would last for a few more decades so both the theatrical and cinematic versions of Women of Twighlight were quite pioneering in their time, calling for compassion to unwed mothers and seeking for societal acceptance. Of course nowadays nobody blinks an eyelid about unwed mothers and babies are freely born out of wedlock. Women of Twilight seems a bit over the top now, in its depiction of baby farming, but it caused quite a stir at the time.