Cinema Quarterly (1934 - 1935)

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the rock from which its miners quarry their coal — the long-drawn misery of a lockout. True, there is a concession to melodrama in the last reel, when the hero brings men and masters to terms by barricading himself in the mine with enough dynamite to blow it sky high ; but the film does make a devious attempt to express what is above all characteristic of a mine strike — the flat monotony of days passed in futile negotiation. Upon the larger drama of the lockout is superimposed the personal tragedy of Radek's desertion by the girl he had expected to marry. Except in so far as it reveals his character it hardly matters, and both her penitent return to him in the interests of a happy ending and his ready forgiveness of her lapse do violence to psychological probability. Though not, on the whole, up to the standard of / Am a Fugitive, this film has definite importance as an index of America's increasing absorption with her sociological problems. Campbell Nairne. THE THIRTY-NINE STEPS {British. G.-B.). The main plot of John Buchan's novel remains, with many of the individual situations, the Scottish setting and the hero, Richard Hannay; but the story has been thoroughly modernized and a light romantic element introduced. Alfred Hitchcock, with Ian Hay and Wyndham Lewis, have done much to translate speech into action, and the film from the first foot is action. He tells the story clearly and convincingly and the wildly melodramatic moments are in part offset by such well observed sequences as the Scottish political meeting, the Forth Bridge episode, and the discreetly managed scene in the inn bedroom. Robert Donat plays Hannay with an attractive spirit and humour. A blot on the film for Scotsmen is the unconvincing charge of meanness directed at a Scottish crofter. F. H. THE DEVIL IS A WOMAN {American. Paramount). Josef von Sternberg's new film demonstrates most clearly that the director has died and become a photographer. It is at once a most beautiful and an empty film. To Sternberg every shot is something to fondle and caress, a composition to linger over and tirelessly titivate. Even the shot of a letter must have a shadowy pattern across it. If only it were possible to close the mind the eye could gorge itself on this surface splendour; but the inanities of the cheap charade in the background continually interrupt. The film stars Marlene Dietrich, and, like that exotic lady, is a masterpiece of the toilette; but it is lacking in every virtue which made Sternberg a director of promise. F. H. LES MISERABLES {American. Twentieth Century). Two aspects of this fifth or sixth version of Hugo's novel call for comment : W. P. Lipscomb's masterly compression of the theme and Laughton's performance as Javert. Lipscomb has selected most of the essentials and assembled them skilfully, so that while the film has little time to linger for fine effects, it gets over the narrative ground briskly and satisfactorily. And the scenario seems to have suited the directorial style of Richard Boleslavsky who brings the story to the screen in broad, sweeping strokes. The strength of Laughton's performance makes this film more than other versions a conflict between Javert and Jean Valjean. With studied power, he brings this inhuman bully, obsessed with the sacredness of the law, to life and the final moment of his struggle and submission is the most moving in the film. Frederic Marsh's Valjean is competent, but scarcely inspired, and Cedric Hardwicke's restrained performance as the Bishop Bienvenu is over too soon. F.H. Q41