Judge — November 8, 1930 — page 25: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

VG Fire is a foreword to Billy the Kid” in which the producers ask you to look at their new gadget 1 wide sereen—which is just in its They might have included in that preamble the fact that) King Vidor, in playing with this new toy, made Realife is the film. Tt is projected on a wide film, so where the camera once included two t you can now se infaney. just an ordinary movie. name of this new vunta It is but a nd customers in a scene of some value wide film does not make if the producers think th are going for this reason. movi to stampede their theatres just to see a wide sereen full of out- door scenery TM bet them a few dol lars they are crazy. “Billy the Kid" is disappointing beeau with a dimetor as able as King Vidor, and I can’t name who has consistently done work, this Ameri saga should have been made into a robust, entertaining movie. It isn’t. There are moments, when Mr. Vidor throws his camera on the New Mexican ranges, that are lovely and gratifying. There is a scene during which a little man is shot down by snipers that is ts tou But ther re ob, for reasons anything you ever watehe is no real lift to the herewith recited, Mr. Vidor cast a stolid youth, one John Mack to 4 the Kid. He also included a girl—at the be hest of his employers, no doubt—and try as he does, he can’t make you be- lieve that Mr. Brown is anything more Brown, than a movie usual boy and girl anties. In an apo logia, the Governor of New Mexico says that there are liberties taken with the legend of the Kid, but that other- wise the movie is just dandy. I don't what they did with the legend, but what the Governor failed t that thes rio writers any liberties with Holly traditional Western which, briefly outlined, is that a he- man who shoots bad men is loved by a nice girl who eventually forgives his actor going through the care serve is failed to t wood's movie JUDGE By PARE LORENTZ bloody hands beeause he was doing it all for justice. ‘There is no point in calling such a movie “Billy the Kid" it has been produced under the title of “The Light of Western) Stars” wT Border Legion”; “Arizona Kid’; “The Last of the Duanes” “The Virginian” and, only last week, “The Santa Fé Trail.” It is, in other words, the plot that made Zane Grey wealthy, T wouldn't spend so much time with this particular Western except that it is the best of the many silent and talk Wallace Beery is excel- ttempt at charac Scotchman, an r son and Beery, the typical square-shooting marshal of the border country. However, the main character doesn’t come off for two good reasons: John Mack Brown can't and the scenario writer mac ing versions. lent, there terization; is som you English you > him a traditional Western hero, mixed up with a traditional lily-white girl. If Mr. Vidor had not taken liber- ties with the legend of “Billy the Kid” he might have produced” a movie worthy of his last three jobs. If he had characterized him as feminate life ex: where found a slim, ef- Mexican with no interest in spt_killing (and God knows » California he could have in effeminate youth who could Recommended “Billy the Kid"—A ne excitement and tures Boys"—Keaton in an old TLwritten burlesque that uy in spots. For the flying pic Mr. Hughes discov “Dough “Old English” Mr. Arliss docs, ex t 1 a Mashing moribund MG THEY MOV! IL& act like a killer); if he had cut half the dialogue and one-fourth the comic relief; then “Billy the Kid’ would have been something to enjoy, As it is, the Governor of New Mexico to the contrary, it is just a fair picture. sinenr German A! The White Hell of is a very exciting work. — Three actors sit cameraman called Pitz Palu,” piece of healthy around in the takes slides and ice crevasses. picture, camera looking Alps while a movies of very snow The scenes of night to find actors the rescuers working ¢ the aforementioned s excel lent and [ suggest that Rear Admiral Byrd and his boys take a look at the fiving sequences in this movie—they certainly are more of the antics the boys went through at the South Pole. © White Hell of Pitz Palu” is too slow, as are most German productions, but it is easy to watch and, B’ some good exciting than any of course, it is silent. happy circumstance even a British playwright can on occasion ome more swinish than the lowest yes-man in Hollywood, Fred erick Lonsdale’s “The High Road” was made into a movie and it was as a picce of work : afforded for many months. ‘There is new British talkie in town called Loose Ends” and it is ineredibly dull, with actually which the or- chestra accompanies with something like “Hearts and Flowers” while the hero describes how his little sister was seduced —"‘we liked the vulgar the sereen scene were such books—she pals, we Was so in- nocent how he shot the cad who drove her to suicide. 1 ‘t de seribe the extent of the asininities in “Loose Ends” because IT left while two women were talking « how the hero's heart was full of simplicity (even if he did talk as though his mouth was full of hot potatoes). Un fortunately, Edna Best is in this thing, but don’t make the mistake of her—Bernhardt couldn't “Loose Ends” likable. going to see have made comicbooks.com