"SLAVES OF BEAUTY” IS FINE COMEDY AT CRYSTAL PALACE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18393, 20 February 1928, Page 7

"SLAVES OF BEAUTY” IS FINE COMEDY AT CRYSTAL PALACE.

Those who seek to wrest Aphrodite’s fcrown from the dread secrecy of Suburbia may learn all that Fifth JAvenue knows by the simple process of gazing, with amused and enraptured eye, on the activities of the characters in the film play, “ Slaves of Beauty ” fat Crystal Palace Theatre this week. The picture might have been better titled, for as it stands it gives the suggestion of rather weak drama; instead it is dazzling comedy, with just sufficient dramatic interest to temper its gaiety and nonchalance. It is profoundly logical and natural, as the two people who provide all the fun and the suspense are not the inevitable youthful couple, but a near-middle-aged woman, seeking to recapture her glowing youth, and her dull boor of a husband. working on a clay pack that is to give eternal beauty to all the world. (Thrills there for you.) The near-middle-aged one, so subtly played by Olive Tell, played with humour and understanding, and her bevy of friends, try to snatch the fleeting hours by baths, sals, spas. mud. everything on the earth and under the earth; their amazing devices, together with the fclowly-gathering plot, build up a drama out of this slender beginning that is both amusing and serious. In contrast to all this frivolity, there is the plodding spou.se, also admirably played by Jfclmes Herbert. When he blossoms as the sheik of sheiks, all. of course, to teach his mundane-minded wife a good lesson, the fun begins in earnest, and the story whirls along a snappy path of romance and comedy. There is the juvenile interest also, the daughter Dorothy of the beauty-seekers and her mechanical Bob; these two. with the assurance of youth, also set out on a Cjuest, that of teaching the parents their proper place. It all becomes immensely complicated. hilarous and. way down deep, pedagogic. Sue Carol, Who was Douglas Maclean’s fair leading lady in “ Soft Cushions.” is Dorothy, End Richard Walling is Bob. In direct contrast to the first picture is the supporting film. The Overland Stage,” in which Ken Maynard rides and shoots and goes through all the well-known paces, all for the love of a “ ladye.” p[t is a good, healthy Western story, hot. at all impossible, with the wellmannered horse Tarzan assisting considerably. The Symphony Orchestra, Under Mr Alfred Bunz, plays the following musical programme: Overture, “Poet and Peasant” (Suppe), “ Merrie England” (Binding), “ Legende ” (Rawlinson), “Maid of Orleans” (Dvorak), “Christmas Overture” (Coleridge < Taylor). “The Storming of the Bastille” (Leuscher), “Meditation” (Glarounov), “ Don Juan ” (Gluck), “ Spanish Rhapsody” (Kronke), “ Rosemary” (Maidon). The box plans are at The Bristol Piano Company, where seats goa y be reserved- . _ ..