Judge — July 25, 1931 — page 24: what you’re looking at

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

jorced to get off such Minsky malaprops. as “the cook is goosed,” and working with a musical comedy plot that shows ri lationship with “The Black Crook” and some of the early, basic material of the theatre, Charles Ruggles has difficult time with “The Girl Habit.” Mr. Ruggles is an ingratiating actor but I am not sure he is an extraordi- nary comedian and will not be con- ced until his employers sce fit to let somebody who clips jokes from the British and French as well as the local humorous magazines write a show for him. Almost anybody not handicapped with a rlip, clubfeet and false teeth can seem funny to the world imper- ating a drunk. Mr. Ruggles to date holds a record for movie drunks these past two years and, even though he does not drink in “The Girl Habit” he assumes the same papier-miaché sort of réle. Of course, movie executi ve deep-seated and mysterious rea- sons for casting actors. Offhand I should explain. this lousy picture thusly: They realized Mr. Ruggles amused audiences in minor réles so they featured him in a picture. Lack- ing a picture they hired four or five people named Owen Davis and in a few hours a messenger boy arrived at the studio with the manuscript of ‘The Girl Habit. That, of course, is simple reasoning. Perhaps actually an expert proved to the executives that factory output up to July 2 showed a falling off in sex appeal, so Mr. Ruggles was rushed into production with a few tried and true gags and fifteen women. But, gentlemen, I shan't keep you any longer. No matter what devilish scheme may keep the inspector figur- ing late tonight, you can depend on this: “The Girl Habit” is no good. Wires I look back over past movie idols few of thcm seem built entirely of clay, if we excuse some of the pink-cheeked boys, and so JUDGE By PARE LORENTZ even then I shan't argue with the young ladies as I have yet to discover what pl them and why. But cer- tainly, Emil Jannings earned his pop- ularity. Mr. Wolheim was a good actor as well as an unusua vie type. Miss Gish, for ail that I have against her material, is a gifted, and unusual actress. Zasu Pitts is aying standard parts right now but y in “Greed,” and later in p Wedding she was al- lowed to play straight parts « was magnificent; was, in fact, in “The edding one of the most beautiful I can remember. The current and coming popular young movie actress, Miss Miriam Hopkins, has been an able and suc- cessful actress for several seasons. Clive Brook, Ronald Colman, Leslie Howard, and a half a dozen leading men earned some recognition without benefit of movie press agency. All of which shows me that the movie pub- lic, while over-enthusiastic and liable to deification through the influence of millions of publicity columns, never- theless is not entirely cockeyed and capricious in its fancy. T have an idea that few, if any, of the great movie audience actually think Helen Twelvetrees is a good actress, no matter how much money Radio Corporation spends telling us this fact. Furthermore, I doubt if more Recommended “The Front Page"—The best directed picture of the season “Le Milllon*—Another French picture with American comedy better than we have most of the time. “The Public Enemy"—A tough. real- istic gang picture. The best of them all mart Money"—By the authors’ of The Public Enemy.” Amusing and well acted “The Smiling Lieutenant"—A couple of good-looking girls and Mons. Cheva lier, all put to good use by Lubitsch. “The Viking"—An exciting story, of seal hunting off the coast of Labrador. JIUVGWG THE MOV L$ than two or three people in the world will find “A Woman of Experienc worth whatever they pay for the privi- lege of seeing Touched by mem- ories of my childhood I shan't take time here to tell you what I think of Miss Twelvetrees’ ability as an tress. Just remember that * Woman of Experience” is a movie about a Viennese spy and that it is bout as sloppy, and unconvincing, and repetitious and dull and ill-con trived as anything we have had around here since “War Nurse,” and I'll say no more about the young lady. “WWones Love Oxer” is a perfect combination of Broadway. tal- ent. It is a picturization of the old, old play “Daddy's Gone A’hunting,” by Zoe Akins. You can imagine the age of this show when you hear that the husband is an artist secking free- dom, while the wife is a one-man wo man who does not want freedom. I can't begin to describe the ancient lines because the damp heat just about has me, but you needn't worry the lines because Edward Goodn ble stage director, was pr. with a movie camera and discovered that the infant industry is not such child’s play as the boys from Times Square so casually maintain, In fact, n knows little about the ppt that it takes pictures. Thus, he just put his camera in a room and took a picture. He then set it in another room and let two people talk for five minutes until he thought it time to go back to the first room, This ingenuous direction results in a show in which people walk in and out of doors for no apparent reason, in which characters look blankly into the camera and talk for minutes at a time and in which many times you do not know whether it is night, day, morn ing or noon or whether the action is taking place in a house, apartment, hotel or garage. “Women Love Once” has nothing to do with the movies. It is an exercise in camera direction, and one of the worst I ever hope to sec camera e€ comicbooks.com