AROUND THE THEATRES

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 234, 1 July 1939, Page 16

AROUND THE THEATRES

Special Reviews Of New Films

Films screened in Wellington yesterday for the first time have been specially reviewed for “The Dominion” by “E. Stanhope. These reviews, distinguished by the mark * beside the title of the film, appear weekly in the issue following the first change-of-programme night in city theatres.

ST. JAMES THEATRE

KING’S THEATRE

* “The Lambeth Walk” Someone has said that among the better characteristics of the Englishman ie his capacity for laughing at himself. He does this frequently in the English film, "The Lambeth Walk,” which screens at the St. James Theatre, and it would be a more than ordinarily serious-minded audience that would not laugh with him, too. r Thq. story concerns Bill Snibson, a Lambeth Cockney, who lives, so he tells an inquirer, "on his wits.” "You look a bit undernourished” is the quick retort, and the film goes onto show that Bill is really the EarJ of Barford and heir to the Barford ' estates', titles and general perquisites. 1 :

Maurice Moscovitch, well known on the stage in New Zealand, has a small part; Maria Ouspen«kaya, of "Dodsworth” and “Conquest?' gives a delightful portrayal as Boyer’s grandmother; a child whose name 1 have unfairly forgotten is most amusing, and hnt nnt Inncf T.

Lupino Lane is Bill, ami Sally Grey is Bill’s Cockney sweetheart, who ia coldshouldered by Bill’s "Aristoseratchic” relatives, till she finally decided to leave him alone in the niidsf of big ancestral glory. Of course, in good time, the cold shoulders begin to thaw, and finally Bill and his girl are reconciled, to walk out of the picture under a shower of confetti, while the strains of the Lambeth Walk ring out in place'of the Wedding March. The aristocratic family, which claims Bill as a relative is made up of the usual musical-comedy types, ..possibly because, if the formula were varied, we would be lost, but more possibly still, because they are always good- for a laugh. There is the inarticulate snorting peer, who shoves bis conversational ioar into all kinds of gatherings, but never by any chance utters a syllable that is comprehensible to anyone. There is the acid-tongued young woman with an eye on Bill's title; there is a very blood-conscious duchess and ■her tolerant, easy-going husband. This last -part, that of Uncle John, is played by Seymour Hicks, and he is at the top of his form. He is not -seen for long, but is impressive in each of his appearances. The domineering duehees, played by Norah Howard, is done with a touch of burlesque that suits the story, as is the part of Jaqueline (E-nid Stamp-Taylor).

There were two musical numbers —a duet between Sally and Bill; “Me and My Girl,” which ends in a hilarious dance scene in which Bill and a nice muddy pond become slightly mixed; and >the now world-famous “Lambeth Walk,” both vivaciously sung.

From the start, -Lupino Lane, as Bill, “gets away with it,” and takes you into the spirit of the picture. He is no romantic matinee idol. Instead- he is a rather funny little man, with a smudge of a moustache and a fondness for bowler hats, but the burden of the whole story is on- his shoulders and. he carries 'it as though it Were .a featherweight. The whole story is suitably lighthearted, carefree and amusing, though the actual presentation lacks some of the polish that might have been added by more imaginative directing—a fairly common fault in translating a stage show to the screen. The original, however good, sometimes gets in 'the way of creative effort on the part of the director. Some short passages of English photography are not too good, either. That, however, is the worst that can be said of it. .The story goes with a good swing, the jokes-—good jokes, too—come so quickly, Sally Grey.is so attractive, and Lupino Lane is so amusing, that such trifling defects could slip by. unnoticed.

Also on the programme is another of those excellent “Crime Does Not Pay” films, about how. secrets leak out from big armament firms, and how the criminals are brought to justice.

PLAZA THEATRE

* “Stagecoach” There is a treat in. store at , the Plaza Theatre for those who like good action pictures of the wide open spaces. "Stagecoach,” a United Artists’ picture, is not just another Western, but a really exciting talc of the American frontier, effectively directed and convincingly acted by a cast who obviously enjoyed their job. Even the striking outdoor desert scents are dramatically woven into the main theme.

A dance-hall girl, a,United States marshal, a, drunken doctor, a soldier’s wife, an escaped prisoner, a crooked bank manager, a gentleman gambler, a whiskydrummer—and Andy Devine—-are all crowded into a stagecoach running through the Western desert while the Apache Indians are on the warpath. There are the usual reasons for excite-

ment —galloping coachhorses, galloping Indians, bang, bang, bang—quicker than you can think; and done a lot better than I can remember having seen it done for a long time. But beneath it all there are undercurrents of human relationships and personal problems that make the story vividly interesting. The two women. Louise Platt and Claire Trevor, good and would-be-good respectively, handle their parts well,, but the chief honours go to Thomas Mitchell, as the drunken doctor, and John Wayne, as the Ringo Kid. Granted the problems 1 that these people

have to face, the plot runs an extra- ; ordinarily logical i hut none the less ■ dramatie ctourse. i The unpleasantness j of having a baby in i a desert outpost, of | being shot at by Indians, of being stalked by a' relentless avenger in the evening stillness. ! are in no way minimized. These things are given due

weight, not too much and not too little, ■ so t,ha.t the whole effect is a pretty clear reflection of what might have been. ‘ The movies, by and large, have a set i pattern; the handsome bad-man serves '< his jail sentence like a man, and comes . out having paid Ihio debt to society; i drunken doctors always die heroically; 1 and marshals and sheriffs arrest their

: best friends with tears in their eyes. This i picture worlds a kind of double-bluff and ■; comes up with still older conventions of . the movies that are refreshing to a pallate jaded by pseudo-morality. Don’t mistake me, though; this isn’t : an epic of the frontier, but a well-told, unprettified Western melodrama. If you have a taste for that you should be pleas- . ed with it.

STATE THEATRE

TUDOR THEATRE

“The Great Man Votes” And “Twelve Crowded Hours”

The "great man” of the film, "A Great Man Votes,’,’ which screens at the State Theatre, is a scholar who has'turned from book to bottle. lie works slightly, as a nightwatchman, and his children, who know- him for what he is and is not, are his only admirers when the picture opens. Then it. is discovered that he is the only voter in n key precinct and the politicians arrive bearing inducements. What he does about, this situation, and about the relatives who want to take the children away from him, and a great many other things, make up the story. A newspaperman anxious to please his sweetheart, and extricate her brother from a difficult situation, provides good melodrama in “Twelve Crowded Hours.” the other picture. "Twelve Crowded Hours” has fascination, and very exciting and siispenseful episodes as well as the comedy which brings .spontaneous laughter.

* “Nearest Thing To Heaven”

There are several points about "Nearest Thing to Heaven,’ ’the R.K.O. picture which screens at the King’s Theatre, which are worth noting. The first is that as far as I remember, it is the first picture in which Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer have appeared together. The second is that it is Miss Dunne’s first straight dramatic role for many a long day; site does not quite live down the “Theodore Goes Wild” tradition, but she does her best. Also to be noted is that

last, but not least, Leo McCarey, director of the “Awful Truth,” made this picture too. The story starts off to be the gentler sort of crazy comedy, with Boyer and Miss Dunne falling entertainingly in love with each other on shipboard, despite earlier attachments to Astrid Allwyn and Lee Bowman respectively, who are waiting in America for the return of the wanderers. Irene Dunne is a dress-buyer risen from cabaret singing to a matrimonial engagement with her. boss. BoyeF is .a painter who would 'be an artist if only he could give up being a playboy for a while. Stopping off at Madeira, Miss Dunne is introduced to Boyer’s grand-mother, who is so taken with her grandson’s newest girl that she promises to eend Irene her beautiful shawl when she no longer needs it. The shawl plays a part in the story which it would be unfair to mention.

Before arriving at New York, the infatuated couple promise to meet in the 102nd floor of the Empire State Building in six months, each in the meantime undertaking to settle down to the real work which alone could make their new relationship permanently happy. The earlier engagements are broken, of course, with suitable old-world courtesy. In the six months’ interval Boyer becomes famous as an artist with the aid of Maurice Muscovite!:—a super-salesman surely to be able to puff up an artistic reputation for his client on the basis of such ghastly daubs as the one shown' in the film. Miss Dunne, too, gets on not so badly till a few minutes before the longed-for meeting, when she. . . . Well, it is worth going to see what did happen to her, and how in the midst of her troubles and her loss of Boyer, she kept herself cheerful by teaching singing to the Children in the orphanage next door. Of course, with the juggernaut inevitability of the movies, she is eventually reunited with Boyer in circumstances of bitter-sweet happiness, through a combination of his artistic impetuosity, his generosity and his, alleged, genius. Boyer, as usual, is excellent within the narrow limits set for, hiin by Hollywood. I am one - of these cross-grained people who think that, nose-wrinkling, and a whimsical look, however charmingly done, are no real substitute for the fine acting of Which Boyer showed himself capable on the other side of the Atlantic; you might think differently. Mis® Dunne makes a good, though toothy job of her part, but the best acting in the -picture is contributed by Maria Ouspenskaya, as the grandmother. v This is a good show which might have been better if the director had first got some of the comedy tricks of the “Awful Truth’’ out of his system. THEATRE MAJESTIC “The Great Waltz” Perhaps an adding-machine would be needed to count the number of times the city of Vienna and Viennese music have served as the subject of films. The most notable thing, probably, about M-G-M.'s “The Great Waltz,” which continues for a second week at the Theatre Majestic, is that the producer has found something left in the. subject very well worth making a film about. “The Great Waltz” is very nearly the perfect musical-romance in costume; it has a happy, lyrical quality, a surge and sweep ot golden melody, and direction by a Frenchman (Julian Duvivierj which makes one realize why Continental film-makers are today leading the rest of the world. Duvivier and his assistants, particularly the musical director,' the cutters, and the editors, are responsible for much of the success of "The' Great Waltz.” Together these technicians have achieved a sense of unity between the music, the story, and the spectacle, which is quite unusual. The music is that of Johann Strauss, the younger, and it has been translated to the screen in- such a way that even such hackneyed classics as “The Blue Danube” and “Tales of the Vienna Woods” sound as if they are being heard tor the first ‘time.

So coniipletely does the music of “'.rhe Great Waltz" capture the traditionally gay spirit of old Vienna, that it is no_t hard to overlook the gossamer nature o"f the plot. The producer has telescoped some of the events in Strauss’s life, and has iplayetl dueks and drakes with some of the facts; but, at the same time, he has disarmed criticism of this kind by anticipating it, for a foreword states that “The Great Waltz” is more concerned with the spirit of Strauss, as revealed in his music, than with his actual biography. The young composer is seen, therefore; rising to popularity on the tide of his famous waltzes, marrying I’oldi, the .pas-try-cook’s daughter, and then becoming infatuated with Carla Donna, an opera singer. The opera singer is seen' sailing out of his life down the Danube, while Strauss sits down and composes his most famous waltz; and — rather unfortunately, because it mars the artistic effect: of the whole—there follows a finale in which the aged Strauss and his faithful Poldi receive the plaudits of a grateful Vienna. The impression that Vienna was iiiterl ested in nothing but Strauss waltzes, and that even the revolution which put the Kmperor Franz Josef on the throne only succeeded 'because Strauss wrote thcmarch for it, is quite easily gained'

“Submarine Patrol” And “The Edge Of The World”

Not concerned with the awe-inspiring glory that attends the big super-dread-noughts and the fast, sleek destroyers and cruisers, ‘’Submarine Patrol,” which screens at the Tudor Theatre, is concerned with the all-but-obscured "Splinters Fleet.” The "Splinters Fleet” saw some of the most, perilous and exciting naval action of the War. The men who joined the "Splinters Fleet” were not lighters by any means—they were landloving “softies" who wore lookiug for a comfortable berth. But. they were not “softies” for long! “Submarine Patrol” reveals the dramatic scenes leading to the destruction of. U-boats in the famous Battle of Durazzo on October 2, 11)18. A story of the tenacity of a small colony of humble dwellers on the island of Foula, on the edge of the Shetland Isles, clinging to the place which has been theirs for generations—jealous of their isolation, proud of the grim struggle

VOGUE THEATRE

Blonde”

“Pygmalion”

for life with the savage sea, is “The Edge of the World,” the associate film. But slowly the sea has worn them down, breaking even their hardy, proud spirits. A note of defeatism is beginning to ereep into the little colony, a note strenuously contested 'by Peter Manson the Elder, who upholds the stern tradition of independence. In this lie is supported by Andrew Gray, the lover of his daughter Ruth, but all to no effect.

“Kentucky” And “Adventurous

Loretta Young and Richard G.reene are seen in the leading roles in "Kentucky,” a production in colour, which will screen at the Vogue Theatre, Brooklyn, today, and it is their love which brings peace to two great families that have hated each other bitterly since the Civil War. Loretta is seen as Sally Goodwin and Greene as Jack Dillon. The Goodwins and the Dillons are the families that have been feuding. The associate film will be "Adventurous Blonde.”

STATE THEATRE, PETONE

As Eliza Doolittle, the Cockney flowergirl who is “so deliciously low, so horribly dirty,” Wendy Hiller is superb in "Pygmalion,” which will begin a season at) the Stale Theatre, Petone, today. Eliza merely wanted "to be taught to speak • like • a lady in « florist’s shop..' Leslie Howard, as a professor of phonetics, did more. For a bet he turned her into a woman who could mix with society without embarrassment, and then, having satisfied his inordinate ego, he tried to throw her back into the gutter. Howard is magnificent.

More than 100 lambs have been born on Ponui Island, Auckland. Some of the lambs are over six weeks old and all are in good condition.