AMUSEMENTS

Grey River Argus, 3 June 1942, Page 1

AMUSEMENTS

Opera House

“The Round Up” and “Forced Landing.”

“THE ROUND UP”

You've heard about it, you’ve always wanted to see it, and now the management of the Opera House brings it to you, right out of the golden West, the screen’s greatest round-up of roaring, racing, daredevil thrills in Paramount’s Western melodrama, “The Round-up,” now showing, with an outstanding cast, including Richard Dix, Patricia Morrison, Preston Foster, Betty Brewer, Ron Wilson and Ruth Donnelly. Here’s a real rootin’, tootin’ cowboy round-up of bandits, gun runners, thundering hoof beats, lively Western tunes, with two reckless cowboys in love with the same woman. “FORCED LANDING” With hemispheric-defence the keynote to the news of the day, the Opera House presents an up-to-the-minute thriller of fifth column menaces in the sky in Paramount's “Forced Landing,” tiie second feature now showing. In a tropical island off the Pac.fic coast, romance and adventure find new excitement in. hair-raising aerial battles and sky lading spies. The film makes use of colourful, jungle scenes combined with death-defying flights through dangerous mountain passes that promise to hum with suspense. Richard Arlen, ace pilot in private life, is teamed fith a brand new leading lady, Eva Gabor, who makes her film debut after a two-year grooming by Hollywood experts. The cast includes soch outstanding players ns J. Carrol Naish, Nils Asther, Evelyn Brent, John Mullan and Victor Varconi. Regent Theatre Now Showing: “Parachute Battalion,” starring Robert Preston, Nancy Kelly and Harry Carey. Thrilling behind-the-scenes training activities of the 501st. Parachute Battalion provides the sensational 'barkground for R.K.O. Radio’s “Parachute Battalion”, now showing at the Regent Theatre. The story is one 'of powerful emotional appeal and co-stars such favourites as Robert Preston, Nancy Kelly, Edmond O'Brien and Harry Carey, while Buddy Ebsen, Paul Kelly, Richard Cromwell, and Robert Earrat are featured. Aside from its suspense, and its perfectly balanced story, “Parachute Battalion” offers astonishing realism, and a truthful depiction of the newest branch, the parachute corns. The story, an original screen play by John Twist and Captain John H. Fite, U.S. Air Corps, is invested with meticulous authenticity of background and training routine. Special permission was received from the Army’s high command to make the major part of the scenes at Fort Benning, Georgia, home of the 501st. Parachute Battalion. The adventures of four young Americans from widely divergent walks of life are chronicled from the day they enlist, in the Battalion. It shows them undergoing the severe training routine which changes them from raw material to fighting man-machines in the most thrilling and dangerous arm of the service. Then comes the crucial test, the first jump from a transport ’plane fifteen hundred feet up. Through the wizardry of the camera and the realistic work of the picture’s stars, spectators are taken through every step, visually and emotionally, of the parachutist’s first jump from a transport ’plane. Hard, irascrible but kindly Sergeant Bill Richards becomes, in the capable hands of veteran trouper Harry Carey, one of the most memorable portraits of the typical old army war horse ever lo reach the screen. The sergeant’s daughter, Kit, as played by Nancy Kelly, is the very charming love' interest and the cause of bitter rivalry between two of the youths, a rivalry which almost wrecks their careers. Thrills, human interest, novelty, a good love story and intense psychological drama delightfully relieved by generous sprinklings of good comedy, are all rolled into a bundle as efficiently prepared as a packed parachute, in “Parachute Battalion.”