Judge — June 25, 1932 — page 28: what you’re looking at

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

s I write this the two big cathe- A drals of the motion picture in the city, the Paramount and the Roxy, sit with their ylorious military ushers, their Elizabethan Rooms, their Hunting Rooms, their priceless paintings and monuments to the leaders of the infant industry, practically quiet and unmolested. Where once ex-Missouri football players shoved the citizenry in line with all the grace of the Homicide Squad manhandling a crowd of wait- ers you now can stand and cool your- self in the blast of frozen air shot out of the theatre and read the Police Gazette in quiet. The Roxy Theatre is in receiver ship and has started a new policy which seems little different from any other policy carried on in that theatre, for the very reason that a picture theatre never needs any policy other than good motion pic- tur or, at least, movies which bring in customers. The new policy seems to be mer that they have hired a good mu n to put on in- door concerts, a commendable move indeed except that, instead of having the Roxyettes display their toe dances, the management should fur- nish the Seven Sutherland Sisters, beer, and W. C. Fields. Lacking beer and Mr. Fields the music is hardly worth the price of admission. The movie this week is a German picture “Monte Carlo Madness,” with dialogue in English, which seems to be an old Shubert musical comedy neatly filmed by Cecil B. De Mille. Perhaps it is not as badly directed as all that, but it is surely as phoney with its Queen of Pontenero and its tinny songs, as anything that used to come into town in the beefsteak and potato era of musical comedy. The chief attraction in this G an musical picture is a Frau Maritza. For all I can see we have enough foreign gals to keep all the cameramen in the country busy. We have Miss Damita, we have Mis: Dietrich, we have Lupe Velez and we have, up to the moment of writing. Garbo. Why make matters worse Possibly the astute producers are preparing to launch another epoch procedure—a new face with every picture, But if the faces are e: posed in tripe like ‘Monte Carlo Mad- JUDGING THE MOVIES . By PARE LORENTZ ness” the receivers and owners of the nation’s cathedrals may as well polish up their fishing tackle, lay in a supply of canned goods and call it a day. HE P. ing a pi mount The: ture called the Evening” a rural, obvious produced b small company not question the fact that a * small movie company should be able to make as yood if not better pictures than giant if enfeebled corporations jittery with panic. The fact is that “Strangers of the Evening” is an cbvious comedy, modeled after the most obvious type of movie mystery comedies. On the staye there is a tabloid black revue, starring Ethel Waters. It i f course, up to Miss ers to bring inthe customers. As she has long since ceased to be an oc- casion for shouting in the streets and bouquet-tossing over the footlights, it must be fairly clear to the man- agement that Miss Waters can not coon shout a profit into the theatre. Lacking a movie of any distinction this week they might as well turn the Hunting Room into a pool parlor. \ HEN the two biggest theatres in the city have to take pictur conventionally bad as ‘Monte Madness” and “Strangers of the Evening” you need not search far for the answer to that once-popular dinner table question: what is wrong with the movies? The answer is: there aren’t any movies. The pro- duce etting and fuming in the face of declining attendanc e too frightened to let the cameras grind. They are willing to buy somebody else’s picture. They are willing to make formula stories, because the les manager can show where such nd such a picture made a profit in t St. Louis in 1928, but they have arlo Recommended “A Nous La Liberte.” A French pic The Crowd Re 1. but sometime el Hotel”? your time Lynton.” Talkie nd for the movies, The Passionate ber.” comedy. but a good one Surprisingly Letty An old 26 f no confidence in’ themselves, their help, or their product. You ean, of course, use the same analysis for Wall Street and Washington, Per- sonally, I bought some canned yoods last March, iTH the real grim problems of the day keeping the citizenry jumpy the wov and moral heck- lers of the state seem submerged under a wave of bankruptcy and gloom. One of the first evidences is that every travelling salesman and lodge story known to ten generations can be found for sale on every news- stand, Smut has sold this year and under sure all those ma and book publishers and movie pr ducers who used to dress their dirty wares in lavender and old lace now have thrown away pretence, and like the Minskys, openly sell their muscle dancing. Westward Pz * is not as bad Il that. In fact, it the ver lady-like Ann Harding for heroine and, lest I be served for libel, allow me to hasten to say she is fully clothed and lady-like in every scene and gesture in the picture. On the other hand the story, crudely chiseled from a best-selling novel a rather obvious sex t first see Miss Harding and a youth on their honeymoon and from the dialogue and some of the scenes we are supposed to believe that the young man is a boudoir expert of no little renown. Subsequently we learn that the young man is a writer a rather fantastic supposition which we will allow to go unchal- lenged). Shortly after the marriaye Miss Harding up and announces that she going to have a child. The n artistic soul, is no little annoyed at th nd proceeds to get tight just to show his annoyance. In due time the writer rebels at marriage and children and genteel poverty and leaves his wife, not be- re, however, we are pretty sure good-hearted and wealthy Harry is waiting to put her in an expensive home. Sure enough Ha in the person of the most affected, irri- tating ham of recent years, one Irving Pichel, marries her and sur- rounds her with wealth and two aged in-laws. shows us ngle. We comicbooks.com