The Exhibitor (Nov 1939-May 1940)

SIX POINT FEATURE REVIEWS METRO Congo Maisie „ Family z _ x Melodrama (19) 70m. Ann Sothern, John Carroll, Rita Johnson, Shepperd Strudwick, J. M. Kerrigan, E. E. Clive, Everett Brown, Tom Fadden, Lionel Pape, Nathan Curry, Leonard Mudi, Martin Wilkins, Ernest Whitman Directed by Henry C. Potter. This is another edition of the “Maisie” series with Ann Sothern continuing the name role. Ann Sothern finds herself stranded in Africa where she tries to beat a hotel bill, stowing away on a river boat where she meets John Carroll, former doctor, now owner of a rubber plantation. The boat goes out of commission, and they are forced to seek shelter in an island medical station, run by Shepperd Strudwick and his wife, a station once operated by Carroll. Carroll, who has paid little attention to Sothern, becomes interested in Strudwick’s wife, and then Sothern uses every trick in the bag to preserve the marital status. Strudwick needs an emergency operation and Maisie persuades Carroll to use his knowledge as a doctor and perform the chore. Weaned back to his medical profession, Carroll decides on the practice of medicine and Maisie, who saves his life by getting into her dancing costume when the witch doctors enlist the natives to kill him off, posing as a witch, taking credit for bringing on a rain storm, through magic tricks, sending the natives back to their huts convinced of her magic powers. Audience reaction was good. Estimate: Dualler with selling angles. MONOGRAM Chasing Trouble (3917) Family Melodrama 63m. Frankie Darro. Marjorie Reynolds, Ceorrte Cleveland, Alex Calln.m, Ma.nton Moreland, Lillian Elliott, Milhnrn Stone, Tristram Coffin, Stanford. Jolley, Willy Costello. Donald. Kerr, Cheryl Walker. Directed by Howard Bretherton. Bottom-half dualler fare, “Chasing Trouble” is one of the weakest and least plausible Frankie Darro vehicles Monogram has made. Still cast as a youngster, Darro is a delivery boy for George Cleveland’s flower shop. He mixes graphology and “playing Cupid” with his job and gets into plenty of trouble thereby. He believes saboteur Alex Callam is a G-man and plays into his hands. Darro eventually sees the light of day; prevents Callam from blowing up an airplane factory. Marjorie Reynolds (she looks okay since she changed from a blonde to brunette) and Milburn Stone, the romantic interest, provide the brightest spots of the film. Manton Moreland does okay with the comic assignment. Estimate: Weak dual support. The Fatal Hour (3907) Family Mystery Drama 68m. Boris Karloff, Grant Withers, Marjorie Reynolds, Charles Trowbridge, John Hamilton, Craig Reynolds, Jack Kennedy, Lita Cheveret, Frank Puglia, Stanford Jolley, Jason Robards, Pauline Drake. Directed by William Nigh. Chinese detective James Lee Wong, alias Boris Karloff, adds another successful solution to his list of sleuthing successes during the unreeling of this suspenseful mystery drama. It’s the kind of film stuff which has the audience eating out of the screen’s hand. When a detective is killed, police captain Grant Withers and Karloff trail their prey to San Francisco’s Chinatown. Two suspects and an innocent man are also murdered before Charles Trowbridge breaks down and confesses all to Wong, who knew it, anyway. Marjorie Reynolds holds down the romantic lead opposite Withers, and Frank Puglia is okay as a gang-leading suspect. Kaiioff, as usual, gives a grand performance as the suave Oriental detective. Estimate: Wong wows ’em. PARAMOUNT Adventure in Diamonds Family Melodrama 76m. George Brent, Isa Miranda, John Loder, Nigel Bruce, Elizabeth Patterson, Mathew Boulton, Rex Evans, Cecil Kellaway, Walter Kingsford, Ernest Truex, Ralph Forbes, Nikalayova, Charles Irwin, E. E. Clive, Edward Gargan, David Clyde. Directed by George Fitzmaurice. Introducing Isa Miranda for the first time as an important star, Paramount has given the blond Italian charmer a role that fits her like a satin evening gown. Here, Miranda is something on the Dietrich type but has a little less smoulder and a little more fire than the German star. Women should envy but like her. In the story, she appears as a clever diamond thief, operating in South Africa with companions John Loder and Elizabeth Patterson. She vamps English officer, George Brent, into obtaining a pass for herself and Loder to inspect the diamond mines. Brent observes her receiving stolen diamonds from a confederate in the mines, saves her from detection by removing the gems from her handbag. She is convicted anyway, over Brent’s vigorous protest, but Loder escapes. Promised a pardon, Miranda agrees to help Brent trap a band of murderous gem thieves. Trapped themselves by these men later, Brent and Miranda learn that Loder is their chief. Miranda pretends to desert Brent for Loder, tricks the gang, and police arrive in time to save her lovely skin for Brent who marries her. Estimate: Miranda’s possibilities should help. PRODUCERS DISTRIBUTING CORP. The Invisible Killer Melodrama 60m. Grace Bradley, Roland Drew, William Newell, Alex Callam, Frank Coletti, Sydney Grayler, Clen Wilenchick, Boyd Irwin, Jeanne Kelly, David Oliver, Harry Worth, Ernie Adams. Directed by Sherman Scott. The usual girl reporter and policeman story, albeit with good selling angles, this is well done, with Grace Bradley, as the newspaper reporter who pops up through murder investigations carried on by Roland Drew, homicide sauadder. District Attorney Clen Wilenchick, fighting gamblers, is patronized by reformer Boyd Irwin, to whose daughter (Jeanne Kelly) he is engaged. Kelly, however, becomes involved with lawyer Alex Callam at the scene of the first gambler murder, and Bradley helps her to escape. Bradley, looking for scoops, discovers that the men had been telephoning when they were murdered. Analysis proves that the victims had been poisoned first. Through hair-breadth escapes Bradley tracks down master-mind Callam, absolves Irwin and daughter. Drew and Bradley bicker debonnairly through the film, and she telephones her last story to the paper as they clinch. Bradley is cute, and the story is packed with action. Estimate: Fast-moving dualler. RKO-RADIO Abe Lincoln in Illinois Family Drama 110m. Raymond. Massey, Gene Lockhart. Ruth Gordon, Mary Howard, Minor Watson, Alan Baxter, Harvey Stevens , Howard da Silva, Dorothy Tree, Aldrich Bowker, Maurice Murphy, Louis Jean Heydt, Glen Bevans. Harlan Briggs, Herbert Rudley, Andy Clyde, Roger Imhoff. Edmund Elton, Leona Roberts, Florence Roberts, Trevor Bardett, Elizabeth Risdon, Charles Middleton. Directed by John Cromwell. A faithful pictorialization, produced by Max Gordon, of Robert Sherwood’s immensely successful Broadway drama, “Abe Lincoln in Illinois,” this emerges as one of the greatest, most warmly human films on the homely rail-splitter that Hollywood has ever turned out. Raymond Massey gives a moving performance in the title role, the best he has ever done on the screen, with Ruth Gordon, who also played in the original stage cast is splendid as Mary Todd, Lincoln’s ambitious, prodding wife. The box-office possibilities of this picture are obvious. All sorts of tie-ups can be effected with schools, church groups, patriotic and other societies, etc. — all of whom will have a deep interest in this film. The story is almost an exact duplicate of the stage play, a few minor changes of course having been made. It opens with Lincoln as 455 * January 24, 1940