OUTSTANDING TALKIE.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 146, 22 June 1931, Page 3

OUTSTANDING TALKIE.

f=o very popular bas “Last Lynne” proved with the public that it has been found necessary to extend its season at Crystal Palace for a second week. This Fox talkie version of the famous play Is in every way excellent, with a cast That is really brilliant, and it well deserves the enthusiastic reception accorded to it. “BODY AXD SOUL.” Unusual interest centres in the new picture, “Bodj' and Soul,” which is coming to Crystal Palace on Saturday next, because it stars the new find, Elissa Land!. Talking picture production has developed so much along the lines of screen drama that a search has necessarily set in for actresses of great emotional power—women capable of giving reality and naturalness to the very tense “situations” that screen drama delights in. Some of these “situations” have been obviously beyond the capacity of certain old “silent” stars, who have either sacrificed restraint In a vain effort to “shake things up” or who, erring in the other direction, have fallen into flatness. Of Elissa Landi it can be said that she has the magnetic quality that holds an audience without effort. There is no labouring to procure an effect, but th*e effect is there. She is subtle without inviting the accusation of subtlety; at the same time, there is something elusive about her—something clearly- felt, but not obtrusive. Passion as presented by Landi cannot tax the credulity—though this is frequently the case when a poor actress and a poorer director come together. The cast is not only headed by plapers of personality like Landi and Charles Farrell, but is composed of capable support players. Farrel is a flying officer who, against orders, flies with his nervous chum * Watson) when the latter loses his life in carrying out an order to . destroy a German balloon. In Watson’s interest, Farrell seeks out Watson’s mistress in London, and meets Watson’s widow, who poses as the mistress. This lady is played by Landi. Although he wrongly believes her to have been Watson’s paramour, Farrell is fascinated by her, and this is where Landi’s art has its opportunity. Both are accused of spying, but the denouement is that Mrs Watson reveals her identity, and the real spy is the mistress (Myrna Loy).