ENTERTAINMENTS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 12 January 1940, Page 8

ENTERTAINMENTS

CURRENT ATTRACTIONS STATE: “WUTHERING HEIGHTS,” THREE SESSIONS TO-DAY. SHOrPERS SESSION AT 5 p.m. Samuel Goldwyn, dean of the more artistic of Hollywood's film producers, in translating Emily Bronte’s famous novel, “Wuthering Heights,” to the screen, has produced his greatest triumph. The picture has been acclaimed the most outstanding picture so far of 1939 because of its compelling artistry, its beauty and dramatic power. Emily Bronte, the lonely spinster who wrote “Wuthering Heights,” died 91 years ago, at 30 years of age, without ever knowing that her book would become one of the imperishable treasures of English literature, and that she had given to the world a haunting, tragic love story that would thrill generations whose grandmothers were then unborn. It has been said that no woman living to-day anywhere in the world is capable of writing a book equal in power and splendour of imagination to the novel written by this lonely girl in 1847. Now as a motion picture it has become one of the outstanding hits in all motion picture history. Goldwyn gave the role of Cathy, the heroine of the story, to Merle Oberon. He chose Laurence Olivier for the role of Heathcliff, and gave important roles to Flora Robson, David Niven, Geraldine Fitzgerald and Hugh Williams, all of them English players of distinction. The story was adapted by Ben Hedt and Charles MacArthur, who have retained all of the strange haunting quality of the original. It is concerned with thwarted love and terrible vengeance; the tortured love affair between Cathy rnd Heathcliff, the stablehand; her eccape by marriage to Edgar Linton, and Heathcliff’s savage retaliation. The strange three-cornered love story is told with dramatic impact, sweeping romance and in terms of stark human emotions, mysteriously influenced by the desolate Yorkshire moors.

COMMENCING TO-DAY AT THE MAJESTIC: PETER B. KYNE’S “VALLEY OF THE GIANTS”

An intensely dramatic film story, enacted by a great cast, and based on a well-loved novel, add to this the exquisite pictorial beauty of California's redwood country, filmed in vivid Technicolour —and you have "Valley of the Gian Is,” based on the famous Peter B. Kyne novel. The Kyne saga of the redwood forests has been picturised twice before—in the days before the screen learned to talk Milton Sills and Wally Reid were the stars, and they have a worthy successor in young Wayne Harris. who is probably closer to the author’s conception of the hero than either of the former stars. He is to the very life, the big, lusty—and finely altruistic —young lumberman who fights so valiantly to prevent the despoliation of his beloved redwood forests. Comparatively a newcomer to Hollywood’s list of ranking star names, Morris won his laurels in “Kid Galahad.” Merely listing the names of the performers is impressive enough, for they include Claire Trevor, Charles Bickford, Alan Hale, Frank McHugh, Donald Crisp, Jack Leßue, John Litel and Dick Purcell. But none of them rests on previous laurels; they all prove anew their right to their well-earned reputations. “Valley of the Giants” knits together in one well-integrated tale typical incidents of the successful fight of native Californians to prevent the ruthless despoliation of their famous redwood forests by rapacious lumber interests. Without its “big” scenes, “Valley of the Giants” would still be fine dramatic entertainment; with these scenes, the effect on the audience was actually spinetingling. Colour and sound when added to photography as brilliantly as they are in this production becomes enormously effective dramatic devices. Some of the impressive and exciting scenes are: The felling of a huge, 325-foot-high redwood; the burning down of the land office in the fictitious town of San Hedrin; the rescue of the heroine from a runaway freight car; the crumbling, like a mass of toothpickes, of a high railroad trestle as four redwood-laden flat cars are rolling over it; a bitter hand-to-hand battle between hero and villain on the narrow t6p of a dam spanning a turbulent stream; and the dynamiting of that dam.

REGENT, COMMENCING TO-NIGHT: EDWARD G. ROBINSON IN “THE AMAZING DR. CLITTERHOUSE” AND “MICKE Y THE KID”

Edward G. Robinson comes to the screen at the Regent Theatre to-night in what he has described a? the most fascinating role of his career—the truly extraordinary titled character of “The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse,” a bizarre crime film with hilarious undertones of comedy based by Warner Bros, on the London and New York stage hit of the same name. It is the tale of a distinguished neurological surgeon who embarks upon a career of crime in order, so he says, to study the mental and physical reactions of criminals during those moments when they are perpetrating their crimes. Other members of the impressive cast include Gale Page, Allen Jenkins, Donald Crisp, Henry O’Neill, John Litel, Thurston Hall, Maxie Rosenbloom, Ward Bond, Curt Bois, Bert Hanlon and Vladimir Sokoloff.

The associate feature, “Mickey the Kid,” is an excellent drama with Bruce Cabot, Ralph Byrd and Zasu Pitts in the leading roles.