Picture Play Magazine (Mar-Jul 1929)

68 TALKING pictures are vindicated and justified as never before by Jeanne Eagels, in "The Letter," by all odds the most dramatic picture the talkies have yet offered. To miss it is to ignore a milestone in the progress of the new* art, for surely the history of audible films must ever give a glowing chapter to this no less than to Miss Eagels herself. Every good fan remembers her in John Gilbert's "Man, Woman and Sin," in which, though silent, she was strangely eloquent. Add to that eloquence the power of a unique voice trained to the sheerest gradation of expression, and you have as skilled an actress as the stage in America can offer. Now, thanks to the screen, her acting can be enjoyed away from the Broadways of the big cities. Because of this, and because of her great gifts, Miss Eagels has the opportunity to educate the picturegoing public in subtleties of acting undreamed of by movie cuties and their heavy-handed directors. Lest you get the idea that she is a mere missionary and "The Letter" is a highbrow film, I hasten to assure you that the picture is entertaining first of all and that Miss Eagels is young, slim, and handsome to a highly individual degree. But hers is civilized beauty and not the standardized pulchritude of Hollywood. So, too, is the picture civilized and not a sweet fairy tale which ends with twining arms and lip upon lip in a mist of gauzy photography. It has for its leading figure Leslie Crosbie, wife of an English planter in Singapore, who, deserted by her secret lover and maddened by his preference for a Chinese woman, shoots him. Then follows her trial at which, for once, courtroom drama is justified on the screen by the magnificence of Miss Eagels' simulation of her straightforward innocence. Suddenly to her lawyer's attention is brought the existence of a letter written by Mrs. Crosbie to Geoffrey Hammond, the murdered man. It is in the possession of Li-Ti, the Chinese woman, who not only demands a large price for it, but will sell it only if Mrs. Crosbie herself brings the money. The letter finally in the hands of her lawyer, Mrs. Crosbie is acquitted by the jury and has the prospect of a journey with her adoring, sympathetic husband. But the lawyer must, of course, be reimbursed for the letter he has bought. Thus the unsuspecting husband is brought face to face with his wife's infidelity. His savings gone, his honor, his trust, his love destroyed, he denounces the wife who betrayed him and, in fury, says that her punishment will be spending the rest of her life in the tropics she hates. It is then that the bitter, devastating climax of this extraordinary picture is driven home in the cry of Mrs. Crosbie — "With all my heart and soul I still love the man I killed !" That, she says, will be her hus band's punishment. According to movie conventions this is a darkly unhappy ending, but it is a bright augury of the future of the talkies. For if at this early stage of their development they can flout convention and dare to be courageous, then it means the coming of age of the movies. The cast, recruited entirely from the stage, is devoid of pretty juveniles, but is rich in voices and the intelligence of experienced artists. O. P. Heggie is Joyce, the lawyer ; Reginald Owen is the husband, and Herbert Marshall the lover. Lady Tsen Mei, a Chinese singer well-known in vaudeville, is Li-Ti, and Tamaki Yoshi wara, a Japanese, is effective as the lawyer's clerk who acts as a go-between in making known the existence of the fatal letter. For of O. P. Heggie and Jeanne Eagels triumph in "The Letter," and place the all-dialogue picture on an unshakable foundation of artistic merit. the Glory France. "A magnificent tapestry" best describes Douglas Fairbanks' "The Iron Mask." It is a tapestry that moves and shimmers with beauty, but unfortunately it does not at all times pulse with life or reality. Combining incidents from Dumas' "Twenty Years After" and "The Man in the Iron Mask," it is in the nature of a sequel to "The Three Musketeers," which Mr. Fairbanks produced in 1921. This raises the question whether a costume romance of seventeenth century France is capable of evoking a degree of interest commensurate with the superb production Mr. Fairbanks has given it. For all his dash and daring, D' Artagnan is a florid figure that bears no relation to life as it is lived to-day ; and his romantic exploits, however authentic their backgrounds, take on the aspects of a fairy tale. In this latest incarnation he is again the leader of that gallant trio comprising Aramis, Porthos, and Athos. His guiding purpose is to protect the rightful heir to the throne of France and displace the usurper, his brother. Early in the film we are shown the birth of royal twins and the concealment of one of them by Cardinal Richelieu to protect the throne, and subsequently the conspiracy of De Rochefort to rule France through the pretender. Through this run the familiar figures of Constance, Milady de Winter, and Father