National Board of Review Special Report on Zola

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 105, 28 January 1938, Page 16

National Board of Review Special Report on Zola

PRAISING the film as one of extraordinary merit, the National Board of Review has issued a special report on -‘The Life of Emile Zola,” the Warner , Bros, picture starring Paul Muni now being screened throughout New Zealand. It Is one of the few films ever, to receive a supplementary report from the board. “The Life. of Emile Zola” was enthusiastically supported in a regular report of the board when ,it opened on Broadway, New York, last August. Now, in the special bulletin, it is described in these terms: “ ‘The Life of Emile Zola’ is considered an exceptional picture by the Committee on Exceptional Photoplays of the National Board of Review. It succeeds remarkably in taking a subject quite outside the ordinarily accepted field of entertainment and mak®ing it entertaining in the broadest and deepest sense—interesting, moving and memorable. “By using historical personages it’ gives the heightened impact of actual fact to the abstract truths of man’s never-ending struggle for human justice, and adds to what would have been an important story, even if it had been . fiction, the Immeasurable force that comes from an audience's realisation of something that undeniably happened. Moreover, it deals with matters as vital to-day as they ever were in the past, so effectively that no intelligent person can fail to feel their contemporary significance. “Beyond its excellence as an individual film, it adds another powerful unit to the series of films, of which Warner Bros, are outstanding and pioneering producers, that are broadening the scope of the screen, accustoming movie-goers to something more than mere relaxation in the theatre, increasing the appreciation and expectations of movie audiences and encouraging other producers to risk productions outside the beaten track of ordinary pictures.”