UNRESERVED PRAISE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 118, 21 May 1932, Page 6 (Supplement)

UNRESERVED PRAISE

I “SHANGHAI EXPRESS.” i | (DIETRICH AND BROOK. When Smith’s Weekly praises a picture it is worth seeing. The journal has a deal to say about “Shanghai Ex press,” ami fT.> n other advance news about the film it is one of the best. 'l'hi-. is what the Australian writer stated The film was given the highest award made by the critic for merit—“A.A.A.” “Paramount has come right into the/ picture again—with a picture. 'Shanghai Express’ is one of those til.ns that don’t happen too frequently, unfortunately. 'Smith’s’ considered judgment is that, it is one of the best pictures it has seen since the talkies nagg'd their way on to the white mosquito net. For story, production, realism, photography and the festraint of its convincing acting. the film stands out on its own. “It deals with the half week’s journey on the Shanghai express from Pekin to Shanghai, and in its photo>o graphic accuracy, it. is a triumph for its producer, Sternberg, who took every inch of the picture in the Paramount 111 studios, Nothing short of genius could have caught, in these circumstances; the atmosphere of the East as does this

picture. Even the holding-up of the] express by the troops of the rebellion is as convincing as if it were a “cut” from a newsreel. “Marlene Dietrich? Till you have seen ‘Shanghai Express,’ you have not seen this German star. She is superb. 1 Clive Brook plays opposite her, and I thanks are due to Paramoun-t for again I giving this great artist a chance to do something big. The whole cast is excellent. > “And—it all ends happily; with Marlene Dietrich being kissed to death by Clive Brook on the platform of the Shanghai station, while two and a-half million Chinese hurry by unseeing. Parenthetically, the Dietrich lass retaliates with a grip that stamps her at once as being no -amateur Everybodv’s satisfied.” Thelma Todd, who plays the ’•menace” in Columbia’s “The Big Timber,” besides being one of the most beautiful blondes in Hollywood, is one of the most versatile of actresses. Between her appearances in the Columbia feature she is playing in a series of two-reel comedies with Zasu Pitts which presents her as a slapstick comedian.