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The third film which seems to have the spirit of experiment is Men and Jobs, one of the new Soviet importations. The title indicates one of the film's departures from convention, judged from the standards of the Western cinema, where it is exceptional to find themes concerned primarily with man and his work. But the film further reveals that the Soviet directors are fully conscious of the expressive possibilities inherent in the sound-strip. More often than not sound is used as a comic commentary, naturally and without affectation. For example, when a schoolroom is made of a workers5 train, the engine, unseen, is heard puffing and groaning appropriate comment while an engineer-pupil faced with a knotty problem in elucidation fumbles and flounders. The sequence on the train is the most effective piece of sound-film craftsmanship in a picture whose technical quality, though often high, is not sustained. Its evidence of enterprise gives the film a refreshing vigour seldom found in the stereotyped product of the Western studios.
In the commercial cinema there is at present a tendency to avoid reality and to escape into the colour and romance of the past. Turn over any production schedule and you will not find a single film that faces up to a modern problem, though there will be many that invite us to take comfort in a flattering restatement of the achievements of our ancestors. Even the war films can no longer be said to be of this generation. Forgotten Men eloquently displays the horrors of war, but, of contemporary reference, says nothing more constructive than "Never again!" If it is true, as Philip Lindsay has suggested, that these romantic historical films mirror the mood of our generation, then our generation cannot want at the cinema "films which keep our world before us." It is easier, of course, to turn to the past than to look at the present. It is easier to search out a romantic story from the history books than to select the essential story of to-day and bring it to the screen.
CONTINENTAL IMPORTS
The importation of continental films has shown a seasonal increase this quarter. Although no film with the possible exception of Clair's Le Dernier Milliardaire which, together with Marie and Les Miserables, is reviewed elsewhere, has produced any startling technical innovations, the general standard has been unusually high.
The most interesting film of those under review here is Remous. It is directed by Edmond Greville, an Englishman who played the part of Louis in Sous les Toits de Paris, and has acted as assistant to Clair. This is his first essay as a full-blown director of commercial films. The cardinal virtue of Remous is its refreshing sparsity of
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