DRAMA BECOMES COMEDY

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 78, 28 June 1943, Page 3

DRAMA BECOMES COMEDY

EFFECT OF PASSING YEARS OLD FILM SCREENED IN NELSON The drama of yesterday becomes the melodrama of to-day in an old film which was shown at a private screening in the. Majestic Theatre on Saturday morning. The film, which has been in the possession of a Nelson resident for over 20 years, was apparently made about 40 years ago and it is now scratched and worn There is, of course, no sound track, and the characters tell their story with exaggerated gestures and facial expressions which turn the “heart-clutching” plot into a pantomime for the modern audience. The scene of the short story is set in France in the early years of this century and the old-fashioned costuming and the antiquated motor cars which were then the last word in elegance and luxury are amusing by comparison with the present day. The plot, inevitably, hinges upon the eternal triangle, the hero, the heroine, and the other man, being a sporting young blood of the day. a buxom barmaid with winning ways and her stolid peasant sweetheart who at the last desperate moment saves her from a watery grave. The passing years' have turned the story from the serious and pathetic drama which it undoubtedly portrayed when it was filmed, into an entertain ment which, to-day, is amusing because it is so ludicrous.