PICTURE THEATRES

Evening Star, Issue 21655, 26 February 1934, Page 10

PICTURE THEATRES

HAND There may be those in the commurity to whom the style adopted l by Grade Fields does not appeal, out even they will have to admit, if they should visit the Grand Theatre, where ‘ This Week of Grace ’ is showing, that she knows how to make her particular kind of entertainment attractive, and make tlie efforts of other artists seem poor by contrast. ‘ This Week of Grace has, as the basis of the plot, a theme which is not new, but one which is always sound l —it concerns the elevation to unexpected wealth of a- poor girl and her struggles to fake her place in a stratum of society to which she is quite unaccustomed. It would have been hard to find an actress more capable than Grade Fields of interpreting cor- ' reotly the somewhat uncouth factory girl and the girl who later is sure of herself in any company. ‘This Week of Grace ’ does not rely upon the story to carry it along. Music is an important part of the production, and Gracie Fields sings happily and tunefully. ‘ My Lucky Day,’ ‘ Happy Ending ’ ‘ Heaven Will Protect An Honest Working Girl, ‘ Mary Rose,’ ‘ When Cupid Calls, and ‘Melody At Dawn ’ are equally attractive. The plot is too good to miss, and it has such a plethora of extremely tickling scenes and episodes that it might be necessary to see it twice 1 cfore all of it is to be appreciated and remembered. Gracie Fields - uses her intensely, amusing and captivating personality to greater effect than ever.i Her alertness to every humour and her wholehearted, spontaneous acting have given this picture high artistic merit. Gracie - Fxelos hy no means stands alone m her splendid performance. . Of the supporting players perhaps the most outstanding is Frink Pettingell, as Gracie s father. Few who see the, : picture will forget the sight he presents sitting in the kitchen with a hot towel round his r head and his feet in a bath tub. His broad accent makes him fit into the 1 • picture as naturally as the backgrounds, and his faithful helper, Joe, is also a character Dunedin, audiences will want to see more _of. This part is played by Douglas Wakefield. This player has a range of facial expressions possessed by -few, comedians, any bis every appearance on the screen is the, signal for a burst of laughter. EMPIRE / The Narcissus Seccoma was an old, ; dirty, and decrepit tugboat, with < wheezy, flue-choked boilers, reaching the lowest depths -of nautical respectability when she became a refuse earner, yet she was always a palatial, lovable old home for Tugboat Annie, for she represented 1 her very existence, and was the nest in which she had trained her only ’ fledgling and , had lived the-best years of her life. Marie Dressier neyer has had » role made for her more perfectly adapted to her inimitable artistry than that she takes in ‘ Tugboat Annie,’ now at the Empire. With WaU , lace Beery as Terry, her ne’er-do-well husband, whose energies are , perpetually directed to the obtaining of “moonshine,” and drinking it irespective of the time of place, the parr work together.with absolute success and are responsible for one of the most enjoyable, pictured that either has been associated with. Annie, has one aim in life —that is, to see her son Alec, excellently played by .Robert Young, master of a great ship. His career from his early training in the unhealthy environment of a filthy, greasy engine room and seldom-cleaned little tug to the peak of his inother’s ambition - forma the main theme of the story, and in. its . .. development there is at times really riotous mirth wheu Annie *aud Terry intermingle, in lively domestic scenes ; there is, too, touching pathos in the depth of the sentimental attachment of the old pair to the scenes of their struggle for existence and their Pride - in tfie success of tlieir son, and thrilling drama when the great liner is in danger of foundering in a terrific .storm, but - is saved by the despised saeered-at Narcissus. But fun-making is the main appeal of ‘ Tugboat Annie, and in this regard there are none more talented than Marie Dressier and Wal : lace Beery, whose most outstanding success is undoubtedly in this picture. , The, supports are equally enjoyable and varied. ' ST. JAMES Powerful in its conception and vigorous and convincing in its delineation, ‘ Loyalties,’ the screen adaptation of John Galsworthy’s famous play, at the - St. James Theatre, is a production which strikes a heavy blow at racial snobbery. Its significance cannot be escaped, and the co-operation of _tb© ' exceedingly strong cast with the ideas of ’ the master playwright who conceived the plot has resulted in one of the most gripping dramas that has ever been presented before a Dunedin ' audience. The story itself has received the most deft handling, for had it been i otherwise the full force of its moral would have been lost. Similarly, the production needs, for its points are not blatantly obvious, but are rather so cleverly worked into the story that a certain amount of perception is required to gain a full appreciation of its worth. The players themsleves have no-easy task to face,, for to convey the significance of racial prejudice without descending to the offensive, to present both aspects.fairly; to live with Jew and with Gentile, and to evoke unease, and sympathy and respect, is required of them in their various capacities, and the strongest commentary upon their work, must be the undoubted appreciation with which the production was received by yester-. day’s audience. Standing head and shoulders above the remainder of the case is Basil Rathbone.. As Ferdinand De Levis, the Jew, his acting is little ..short of magnificent. Delicacy of, gesture and l of intonation, as well as a ; poise which stamps him as an actor of infinite feeling and experience, combine to make his characterisation one of the most convincing ever seen in a British production, which in itself is one of the highest marks of qualification in sound film entertainment. There is an excellent programme of supportting pictures, consisting of a New Zealand pictorial displaying the majestic beauties of Milford Sound and several scenic films of various parts of the worfd which are masterpieces of photography. RECENT To anv one who is at all air-minded ‘ Central Airport,’ at the Regent, must have a strong appeal, for as a. flying picture there has been nothing in Dunedin to surpass it for some years. Unlike most aviation pictures', it is not a war film, but portrays ably many of the aspects of commercial flying and the risks that are occasionally run, especially in hot climates, where cloudbursts, electrical storms, and fogs of a pea soup consistency are not uncommon. Some of the scenes in this picture display not only a marvello.us skill in aircraftsmanship, but also in the actual photography, and it seems that the cameraman himself must have run even greater hazards than Richard Barthelmess, who pilots the plane and the picture to a happy landing. Barthel-

mess appears as a commercial pilot, who, after years of service with an unblemished record,, crashes in a storm and is placed on the shelf, from which he is removed by the charming Sally Filers, a stunt flyer, who is seeking a partner to take the place of her brother, who stunted once too often. Between these two —Jim Blaine and Jill —a romance inevitably springs up, but Jim, feeling that no man who takes the risks he does has a right to get married, allows the affair to go on without the conventional wedding ring. The arrival of his younger brother compli cates the position, and in a fit of desperation Jill marries him and the partnership is dissolved—stormily. Jim’s life itself is stormy from that moment. In China he leaves an eye, in Chile part of a leg, and other souvenirs in other countries, and builds himself a reputation as a crack pilot until he returns and sets out in search of his brother’s passenger plane, which is reported missing at sea. His search provides the most dramatic and thrilling scene in a picture that abounds in thrills, and the flight home in a dense fog and the landing are not the least Of the sensational incidents with which the story is packed. Supporting the main picture is an interesting chapter of short films. STRANR Charlie Chan cracks one of the hardest nuts he has ever encountered in his criminal dessert in ‘ Charlie Chan’s Greatest Case,’ at the Strand. Warnei Gland appears in the role he has made famous, that of the astute and wily Chinese detective whose talents are this i time employed by the Honolulu police to unravel the mystery surrounding the death of Dan Wintershp, a member of an aristocratic Boston family. The sunlit islands of Hawaii may not seem a very appropriate setting for a murder mystery; but this beautiful and artistic background is made by skilful direction and clever photography to, emphasise the realism and effect of the plot. Amateur detectives and all those who make a pastime of “picking the villain ” halfway through the plot of the usual'mystery film will find plenty to occupy their interest in Charlie Chan’s Greatest Case.’ Warner Hand revives his favourite role with his usual sleepy wakefulness. His courteous Chinese rebuffs, directed at his critics in the case, are quaint and amusing. His philosophical reliance on an inscrutable fate ” exasperates while ■ it amuses; and the telegraphic brevity of his speech-is another delightful whimsicality. To many people Charlie Cbaji is almost as real a person as Sherlock Holmes, and his latest and “ greatest case ” will ha no wise dimmish his reputation. ' / - .' OCTAGON The feature of ‘ Big Brain,’ at the Octagon Theatre, is the role by George E. Stone, who is seen as : a barber s aj)prentice who, despite his humble - position in life, is consumed with an ambition to become wealthy. Not overscrupulous in his method, he commences from small beginnings and graduates through a series of wild-cat schemes to comparative affluence. Not. content with this, he extends bis activities, and, acting on the principle that conscience should not enter into finance, he pushes his adventurous, way upwards until he is the recognised leader' of the more or less shady band of financiers whose activities range from kerbside broking to the operating of bucket shops. His overweening conceit and 1 confidence in his own cleverness eventually lead to his downfall, which _is a good deal more spectacular than his rise. He is possessed of the idea that he is immensely popular among the ladies, and it is his belief in hi? infallibility in this respect that finally lands him in gaol. The story is well told, and running throughout is a clever veto of satire that gently pillories the methods of some or New York’s “ get rich ; quick financial operators. A screen version of Rex Beach’s-novel, ‘The Goose Woman,’ under the title of ‘ The Past of Mary Holmes,’ is also showing. It is a powerful drama, which deals with the bitterness that enters the heart of a famous singer when, through the birth of her ■on, she loses her voice. KINS EDWARI One of the most appealing and moving romances ever shown on the screen, ‘The White Sister,’ is seen in a new and modernised form at the King,Edward. The present version >is an entirely different one from that in'which Lillian Gish and Ronald Colman were so successful on the silent screen, and the story has been rewritten to bring its wealth of human feeling into greater prominence. It concerns the love of an Italian girl for an officer whom she meets at a carnival, and how she severs herself from the world and enters a convent when he is brought down in an air crash and is given up for dead.'His dramatic return after she has been fully initiated as a nun forms a fitting climax to the film. Clark Gable, vinTe actor of ‘No Man of Her Own,’ and Helen Hayes, described as the foremost emotional actress in America, have the principal roles, and the supporting cast includes Lewis Stone, May Robson, and Louise Glosser Hale.