ENTERTAINMENTS

Southland Times, Issue 24056, 21 February 1940, Page 2

ENTERTAINMENTS

REGENT THEATRE “THE FOUR JUST MEN” SEASON EXTENDED To meet popular demand the season for “The Four Just Men” at the Kegent Theatre has been extended and will now conclude on Friday evening next. It is very seldom that a picture combines so many aspects of interest, so many angles of appeal, as does this national and international drama. One powerful reason for its deep appeal is that it deals so vividly with what is occurring, in greater or less degree all over the world today. In popular entertainment, “The Four Just Men is a thriller, but behind the thrills there . 1S a sincere purpose, a quality ot idealism, of patriotism, which. converts the thrilling entertainment into subject matter for thought. How skilfully this effect has been achieved is not at tirst evident. It is an example of the art that conceals art, and the producers are to be congratulated on their success m this direction. The names of the actors in the drama are not stressed. This has a two-fold or even three-fold value. There is nothing to distract the mind from the action, which thereby achieves a greater degree of seeming actuality. There is the implication that the players are less important than the message which the drama conveys. And there is the subtle suggestion that what is occurring to these people on the screen might be easily occurring to any one of us. The players have been admirably chosen for the various characters which they represent, and throughout the whole of the story they move and act as human beings, never over-acting and in most cases achieving effects of the highest dramatic value by the very restraint .which seems so appropriate to the theme. Io I New Zealanders £ The Four Just Men has particular application, because it bases its action on a supposed plan to block the Suez Canal and to cut the oil-pipe line of Iraq, thereby severing communication between Britain and the East, inclusive, of course, of Australia. The supports on this programme mclude “March of the Movies, This Place Australia” and the latest newsreels—all out of the ordinary, and well worth while. STATE THEATRE WILL HAY COMEDY “ASK A POLICEMAN” The well-known British comedian, Will Hay, ably hindered by Moore Marriott and Graham Moffatt, has blundered through many Public Services. In the G.B.D. attraction, A sk A Policeman,” which will be presented at the State at 2.0 and 8.0 today, the three do their best to ruin the local rural constabulary, and here they make an hilarious digression into what they imagine to be the realm of the supernatural. As members of the police force in a village that has had no crime for 10 years, five weeks and four days, they are faced with the necessity to justify their by no means miserable existence, and to do this .they endeavour, blissfully unconscious of the fact that the village is a hot-bed of smuggling, to create an artificial I “crime wave.” They soon find that there is a real one in full swing. An old country rhyme, the last line of which they have some understandable difficulty in remembering, forms the basis of the ghostly doings in which a headless horseman is supposed to drive a hearse lit by ghastly lights across the countryside. Although Will Hay and Graham Moffatt are definitely sceptical, Moore Marriott believes it to such a point that he even tells the Chief Constable that when he saw IT he lost his hair and all his teeth fell out in a night! In a wildly hilarious sequence, the three blundering policemen try i frantically to escape in their car from the galloping horses and the ghastly driver. Special featurettes include a I newsreel featuring the war on the Western Front. Box plans are at Begg’s or State. Telephone 645. MAJESTIC THEATRE “BROTHER RAT” AND “STRANGE FACES” TWO GRAND COMEDIES TODAY Warner ' Brothers’ “Brother Rat,” which is now showing at the Majestic, has a most misleading title. First, it is not a gangster picture, but a rattling good comedy ot the life at the Virginian Military In - stitute. “Rats” at this establishment are first-year cadets whose privileges are few and rules many. The leading roles in this picture are played by Priscilla Lane, fresh from her triumphs in “Four Daughters,” handsome Wayne Morris, Ronald Regan, Jane Bryan, Johnny Davis and Jane Wyman, while I Eddie Albert, who played the part ot ! the youthful father on the New York stage, has the same part in this picture. Mirth and mystery are the keynotes I in “Strange Faces,” Universal s comedy mystery thriller which is the associate feature on today’s programme at the Majestic, 'Hie latent Universal News will introduce the programme, and plans are on view at H. and J. Smith’s Departmental Store Rice’s Majestic sweet shop and at the Majestic Theatre (telephone 738).

HENRI THE GREAT SEASON OPENS TONIGHT Although the magician, like Father Christmas, loses most of his mana the moment it is suspected that he is not quite the miracle worker it was first thought he might be, his wand has never ceased to entrance multitudes of even the most sophisticated to the theatres. Henri the Great has a great penchant for animals, and at the slightest provocation produces them from space. Henri’s birds show their superior training and education by turning up the instant they are required, and the dispenser of magic is not compelled to indulge in a wild orgy of bird imitation to effect his purpose. Great interest is shown in the advertised box escape. Another specialty, Sonny Moran and his Rocky Mountaineers, set amid a western rodeo scene and coloured effects, with real horses, should prove very popular. There are several other talented artists on the bill. Box plan now open at Begg and Co. Free booking. ' THE EMPIRE, RIVERTON A rare treat is in store for music lovers at Riverton tonight, when Richard Tauber makes a welcome return to the screen in “Pagliacci,” a screen version of Leoncavallo’s famous opera. Steffi Duna, who rose to fame in “La Cucaracha” and “Devil’s Pirate” is Tauber’s leading lady.