STRIKING ENTERTAINMENT

Evening Star, Issue 22004, 13 April 1935, Page 10

STRIKING ENTERTAINMENT

• THE MAN WHO RECLAIMED HIS HEAD 1 * The Man Who Reclaimed His Head,’ now at the Empire, is a production of absorbing interest. There is really a terrible significance about the strange title which this interesting film bears. A man does reclaim a bead, literally; he realaims, too, ii_ noble soul and a great mind which, given unstintingly in the cause of world peace, had been misused and betrayed by the forces working against peace. The film is mechanically and artistically of a very high order; its story moves one intensely, and the acting reaches a pitch of excellence where every characterisation runs smoothly in the fine rhythm of the tale. But it is as a piece of antiwar propaganda that tho film seems to have its highest value. Whatever individual views may be about pacifism and war, this story must have a profound moral influence against aggressive militarism and against the machinations of warmongering armament manufacturers, if any such dreadful persons as those portrayed here exist. Strictly this could not be described as a war film. It is not just another ‘ Journey’s End.’ There is blended with the propaganda of the film a talc of ordinary domestic love which takes away some of the bitterness of many of its scenes. But there is still the urgency, of a serious moral. The real war in. this picture is made behind the lines by the men who represent an international armament ring. A young French writer and politician, whose work is devoted to the cause of peace and to a lifelong campaign against aggressive warfare, sells his mind to an ambitious French politician, Dumont, who needs such a master mind as this if his ambition is to succede. The bargain is made to please the young journalist’s wife. For a time Dumont, using the journalist, secures remarkable influence through anti-war propaganda in the years before 1914. But when Europe is stirring with the war fever this influence of Dumont becomes a barrier to the ambitions and dividends of the armament firms. They buy him over. The journalist and his cause are )>etrayed. So well is the story told that one feels that, .had the politician been content to wait another week, the journalist would have won the day for both of them and for his cause. The young man leaves his wife in Paris and goqs. to the front—his pacificism cannot prevent him from fighting to defend his country. Dumont, whose volte face has _ greatly influenced the cause of the militarists, seems to gain only partial satisfaction froni his success; having met the journalist’s pretty wife when endeavouring to persuade her to change her husband’s mind, he later endeavours to seduce her. Fighting not far from Paris, the young man hears rumours of this new betrayal and, deserts. His vengeance is terrible. The whole picture is strange and compelling. The acting is more than acting—it is living. Both sides of the armament question are fairly and dramatically stated. Claude Rains as the betrayed writer makes the flesh of men creep in one scene and makes weep in the next. Joan Bennett, his wife, acts splendidly and with the restraint which is her most valuable stage asset. Lionel Atwill has the role of the ambitious politician, and in the smaller roles are noticed the faces of quite well-known film people. There is a _ supporting programme of considerable interest.