The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

Theatrical Film Critique 39 ve-cheated son of the miser, shrinking fear from the mob that came to lynch m for his crime committed in a minute morbid self-pity against the ugliness his life; shrinking first and then fight- g- against the belated love of his con- rted miser-father, George Hackathorn splendid. Film audiences have but tely seen him as the Little Minister. r e doubt if there has ever been a untenance before the camera.with as Iff] spiritual quality and sensuous rength as the Little Minister's. As the agic Amos, Hackathorn's remarkable ce makes the silence of the cinema ive with an almost audible stirring of e emotions. That is not a clear state- ent yet it expresses our reaction to one the most unusual faces in the history moving pictures. We can not help ■fling that the movies of decades hence ight have these intelligent, super-sensi- f] features to use in their higher •velopment. As it is we can only hope at Mr. Hackathorn will be given the st possible chances to fulfill himself. HE SONG OF LIFE A difficult picture to analyse fairly, le press has called this film one of the < best of the month. In part, surely, e press is right. The picture is power- lly suggestive of how the gravest anges in our lives are executed in hasty d hysterical rebellion against the per- cent irritations of the routine exist- ce. Dreams fighting for life amidst e noise and odor of New York's tene- en'ts is typical of like districts in large ties the world over. That this story ncerned a young novelist and his wife but clothing the dream in more unique rsonality. The struggle and its results ;re analagous to those of the wife who d "trailed romance to the desert and und, instead, sand and dirty dishes." nd that the woman ran from them to c pretty things she desired, yet never und, and that the baby she deserted is the young novelist whose book was to "express the contempt a man feels for his mother" are but the twists and turns of an old plot. Yet the triteness is always saved by the sincerity of the actors, the excellence of the leaders and titles, and, a commendable piece of cutting and splicing. The only part of the film's triteness that went "unsaved" was the action of the publisher. The gentleman was neither sincere nor convincing. FOOLISH WIVES Another film talked about so much and so long before its actual arrival that the most cynical of reviewers might easily be eager to see it. We hear, too, much about Mr. von Stroheim's difficulty in reducing his story to picturable length. The final result is well done for the film reels out connectedly and smoothly in its narrative although certain scenes are sus- tained to the point of impatience on the part of the reviewer. The titling is ex- cellent, the leaders are throughout ex- clamatory, imagistic lines; the dialogue and essential exposition brief and to the point. The sets are perfect. Nothing has been spared to make them an ac- curate and astonishingly beautiful repro- duction of Monte Carlo and an Italian Villa high above the restless "waves, waves and waves." The cinematography is a tremendous comment on all that the art can be. The cast were well chosen. The elder Russian princess with her cold subtle cruelty, the devil-may-care younger woman with her fearless moments of disgust, the empty faced village girl and her stunted kindly father, the maid and her shadow (by the close-up) decision to set on fire the tower, the vapid American wife and her easygoing heavy husband, and last the morbid, degenerate, sex-mad coun t — represented an achievement in the matter of casts and acting. But, why any human being should care to see the picture we can not fathom. The stories of sex, though they be reek- ing, are a very clean matter beside this almost perverted sensualist, in his ugly