AMUSEMENTS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXII, Issue 14, 29 December 1911, Page 4

AMUSEMENTS.

IKS MAJESTY’S PICTURES

It is seldom that Bernard’s fail to give in their change of programme a film of exceptional merit. Last night one film stood right out among tiio rest, in spite of the many good points possessed by the majority. This was a nature study of several sea anemones, attached to a shell, in which there dwelt a hermit crab, gruesome and spider-like. While the crab feasts on • the body of a fish, the anemones slowly open, spreading forth dainty feelers, which give the appearance of the delicate petals of a prize chrysanthemum. A small fish touches them, and they twist and squirm, clutching the fish and engulfing it as an octo- . pus would its prey, in a cruel embrace. In its class this film is the finest that we have yet had the pleasure 'lf seeing. , , i The dramatic portion of the programme was responsible for introducing two new elements into the game of ‘ love. Firj-jt came the anarchist. with ( ( deadly bomb,,' arid the audience'watched the fuse slowly burning, till the hero, hound with cords, manages to bite himself free with his teeth. In the other, the lovers are Arabs, and the scene is laid in the desert. A few of the methods of punishing transgressois are shown in this picture with good effect. Cowboy films are always popular in Stratford, as behoves a dairying district. In the one shown last night the theme was a good one, and the acting excellent. , Of the funny films “Max' and Hih ‘ Mother-in-Law” and “Midnight Marauders” were as amusing as‘the names would indicate, but were quite eclipsed by the burlesque entitled “An American Count.” The large audience nearly went into convulsions as the young American heiress, who possessed an abnormal desire to call herself “Countess,” married on trust a dashing foreigner, who, stripped of moustache and beard, proved to he her first love, a common American youth. After the ceremony is over the real Count, height 3ft Oin, appears, and is quietly removed hy the footman. A picture worthy of mention was the scenic film depicting the Italian lakes from a mountain railway, and showing the villages under heavy show: Some of the snow effects are particularly good, and the picture is a very fine one. To-night the programme will he repeated.