"DRUMS OF LOVE."

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19467, 14 November 1928, Page 5

"DRUMS OF LOVE."

PAOLO AND FRANCESCA MOTIF USED FOR FILM.

Those wlio follow intelligently the progress of the American and European screen must sometimes have marvelled at the occasional studious treatment that has been accorded a few classics. "Faust" was an outstanding example of this possibility; "Monna Vanna" another. But these people must also have wondered when that most moving and emotional of all tales, the love tragedy of Paolo and Francesca, would attract the notice of some man. And perhaps shuddered to think what might happen to the story. Paolo and Francesca have now come through tho hands of D. W. Griffith, who, with the German Murnau, and tlie linglishman Wilcox, is admittedly the only man who could have possibly handled the theme. Griffith is an artist; he is a strategist with men and women, with personalities; he is also a business-man, and whatever his motif, bp it tragic or romantic, he makes always a "box-office picture." He has made such a picture in "Drums of Love," which will be presented at the Grand Theatre next week. Only the names are changed, and the ending. After so much material beauty, as is shown in. the picture, and after such a pageant of state and colour, and after snch an outpouring of passion and faith—it would still be unjust and scarcely feasible to make the infuriated and jealous husband put his wife and his brother to death. Hence, in the film version of the great Italian tragedy, the husband is an ogly, elderly, deformed soldier, but kindly and understanding; he will not believe his jester when that traitor brings him back , from the theatro ol war to gazo for himself upon the infidelity of his wife and brother; it is he who begs the younger man to tell him himself that lie has not outraged the trust re* posed in him. And it is the bewildered and maddened soldier who turns on the fool in capi and bells, and who receives a jester's dagger in his heart. Lionel Barrymore makes the role of the unloved husband something that lives. His marriage to a young and lovely lady of a Spanish house to save it from annihilation; his love for his young and comely brother; and his love for his wife simply make his a tragic figure in the midst of-all his conquests, of war. Mary Philbin, as the wife, is. a completely new Mary Philbin from' the quiet and untroubled creature of "The Merry-go.-Round," and the passive patriot of "Surrender." With Norma Talmadge, she is still the screen's only emotional and dramatic actress, but she has stolen some fire and feeling which she did not possess before. As a result her portrayal of Francesca under another name is that of a woman who lives

and who demands to be loved. Don Alvarado has some little way to go yet before he r«aches the status of the other two players, but still he is eminently satisfactory. • Other roles, and they are many, are'filled by competent plavers. All aspects considered, "Drums of Love" is • a worthy pictnrisation of one of the' greatest stories in literature. To-morrow morning the plans will open at The Bristol Piano Company.