The Exhibitor (1952)

EXHIBITOR Novtmhtr 19, 19SS ing a mask so that they don’t know him and they don’t know each other. The holdup comes off well, the crooks using a florist truck, a duplicate of one driven by John Payne, an ex-convict who deliv¬ ers flowers daily to the florist next to the bank. Foster directs the crooks to lay low vmtil he thinks the time ripe for the pay¬ off. Payne is arrested, totally beaten, questioned and finally released but he is determined to find the crooks. Following a tip, he finds Elam, learns of the planned rendezvous with the xmknown leader, and goes along with him. When they are sepa¬ rated at the airport, poUce spot Elam, and kill him. Payne goes on alone to a small Mexican town. On his way he meets Coleen Gray, Foster’s daughter. Foster, a retired police captain, plans to spring a trap. The three hoodlums will be caught, and Foster will collect a huge reward. At the showdown, the two crooks are killed, and Foster fatally wounded. Before dying, he clears Payne, and tells the police that Payne should collect the reward after begging him to keep his role a secret from Gray. Payne agrees. X-Ray; A tight, well-made, suspense¬ ful meller, this holds interest on high. The cast does well, and the direction and production are in the better class. The pace is fast, and meller and crime fans should be leased with the result. The screen play is by George Bruce and Harry Essex, with the story by Harold R. Greene and Rowland Brown. Tip On Bidding; Better than average program price. Ad Lines; “Action . . . Fast And Furi¬ ous”; “The Going Really Gets Rough When A Million Dollars Is At Stake”; “He Went After A Gang Of Crooks That Had The Police Baffled.” Outpost In Malaya Melodrama 88m. (Stafford) (Made In Malaya and England) Estimate; Programmer will fit into the duaUers. Cast; Claudette Colbert, Jack Hawkins, Anthony Steel, Ram Gopal, Jeremy Spenser, Tom Macauley, Helen Goss, Sonya Hana, Andy Ho, Peter Asher, Shaym Bahadur, Bryan Coleman. Pro¬ duced by John Stafford; directed by Ken Annakin. Story: Malaya is trouble -ridden, and trouble also extends into the married life of rubber plantation owner Jack Hawkins and his wife, Claudette Colbert. As the danger from bandits grows intense, Haw¬ kins devotes much time to making his plantation safe and less to Colbert. Plans are made for Colbert to take their son, Peter Asher, to school in England, and she gets ready to leave. The attacl^ center on the neighboring plantation, and Haw¬ kins plans his defense more actively. Before she is scehduled to leave, the bandits attack, and everyone pitches in until the soldiers put in an appearance. The rough ordeal brings Hawkins and Colbert closer, and she decides to send Asher to school alone, and remain with Hawkins. X-Ray: With some action scenes plus several other interesting sequences, this import can be exploited. Otherwise it shapes up as another program entry for the duallers with the name of Colbert and the topical theme in Malaya to help thinK out. ITie cast is adequate, the story fairty interesting, and the production and direc¬ tion okeh. The story and screen play are by Peter Proud and Guy Elmes. Tip On Bidding: Program price. Ad Lines: “Tom From Today’s Head¬ lines”; “A Rubber Planter And His Wife Stand On 'Their Rights And Their Love For Each Other Against Everyone”; “Ac¬ tion And Adventure In Mysterious Malaya.” WARNERS April In Pans comedy with Music (209) (Color by Technicolor) Estimate: Highly entertaining. Cast: Doris Day, Ray Bolger, Claude Dauphin, Eve Miller, George Givot, Paul Harvey, Herbert Farjeon, Wilson Millar, Raymond Largay, John Alvin, Jack Lomas. Produced by William Jacobs; di¬ rected by David Butler. Story: Chorus girl Doris Day receives an invitation from the State Department to represent the American theatre at an international arts festival in Paris, but this is really a mistake. Ray Bolger, assistant secretary in the State Department, tries to rectify ^e error, but is told by his super¬ ior, Paul Harvey, that it is a good public relations move and to let it stand, think¬ ing it an original idea of Bolger’s. It is hailed by the press and public. Bolger is engaged to Harvey’s daughter. Eve Miller, who doesn’t Uke the idea of Bolger hav¬ ing anything to do with Day. Bolger is restrained by Harvey on the boat to Paris imtil the last night out when they are brought together by French entertainer Claude Dauphin. Working his way back to France on the boat, Bolger and Day find they are in love. After some celebrating and champagne, they want to be married by the captain. Dauphin’s friend, George Givot, poses as the captain, and marries them, after which Givot and Dauphin spend the night keeping them apart. How¬ ever, they are told the truth the next day after Miller meets the boat, and Bolger has a tough time between not telling Miller of his feelings for Day and ruining his career, and trying to show he loves Day. 'The girls have a fight. Day tries to get Bolger jealous, using Dauphin, Bolger tells off Miller, and goes after Day. They wind up in Dauphin’s home, where Bolger learns that Day still loves him, and that he needn’t be jealous of Dauphin as he is married, and has five children. Straight¬ ened out. Day and Bolger plan ^eir future while dancing together in Paris. X-Ray: Some good comedy sequences, dance numbers, acting and better direc¬ tion and production put this in the better class entertainipentwise. It’s a light, gay, fim-filled entry that should leave audi¬ ences entertained fully. Day, Bolger, zmd Dauphin come off quite well, as do the others in the cast, and the whole thing is enhanced by Technicolor. The screen play is by Jack Rose and Melville Shavelson. Among the times heard are: “I’m Gonna Ring The Bell Tonight”, “April In Paris”, “It Must Be Good”, “Life Is Such A Pleasure”, “That’s What Makes Paris Paree”, “Give Me Your Lips”, “For You”, “The Words Are In My Heart”, and “I Know A Place.” Tip On Bidding: Higher bracket. Ad Lines: “P\in Galore In Paris”; “Ro¬ mance, Fun, And Music Fill The Parisian Night”; “Laugh Your Blues Away With This iW-Filled Hit.” FOREIGN Angel Street (Commercial) (English-made) Estimate: Slow moving British import. Cast: Anton Walbrook, Diana Wynyard, Frank Pettingell, Cathleen Cordell, Robert NewTon, Jimmy Hanley, Minnie Rayner, Marie Wright, Aubrey Dexter, Mary Hin¬ ton, Angus Morrison, and Jack Barty and the Darmora Ballet. Produced by John Corfield; directed by Thorold Dickinson. Story: Anton Walbrook, fashionable Victorian gentleman, marries Diana Wyn¬ yard. They live in a lavish home in London. Wynyard is an innocent, fright¬ ened person, in love with her ‘husband. A number of years before, Walbrook had murdered an old woman in the same house, but the rubies he sought were not to be found. Suspecting that the woman hid them, he spends his evenings search¬ ing the house. His wife becomes suspicious of him. Deciding that it would be better to have his wife out of the way, Walbrook plots to drive her insane. She is made to think that she is losing some of her p>ossessions and stealing some of her hus¬ band’s. Walbrook gets his wife into such a state of frenzy that she is ready to be taken away to a mental institution. Only by coming in contact with a retired police¬ man, who is suspicious of Walbrook, does she find escape. Walbrook’s plot is un¬ covered. X-Ray: Seen before in an American version, this interpretation of the famous play still can provide sufficient excitement and trepidation at times. However, the exaggerated and overwrought acting often causes the fihn to approach the point of satirizing itself. The screen play was writ¬ ten by A. R. Rawlinson and Bridget Bo¬ land, based on the stage play by Patrick Hamilton. Ad Lines: “Is It Madness Or An Evil Plot . . . See ‘Angel Street’ ”; “Patrick Hamilton’s Prize Winning Play On The Screen Again”; “The Story Of An Inno¬ cent Woman Caught In An Ingenious Plot.” The Four Steps Comedy Drama 110m. (Metaxas) (Greek-made) (No English titles) Estimate: Pleasant entertainment for Greek audiences. Cast: Ginette Lacage, Nicos Hadjiscos, John Prineas, Smaro Stefanidou, Anna Kyriakou, Ntinos Eliopoulos, Mimis Fotopoulos, Sophia Veroni, Alec Anastasiades, Panagis Svoronos, Georgia Vassiliadou, Costas Pomonis, Nana Papadopoulou, Eftychia Pavloyianni. Produced and di¬ rected by George A. Zervos. Story: Orphan Ginette Lacage lives with her uncle, a weak man without initiative. Lacage does not get along well with her uncle’s wife and his daughter, and her only friends are the old servants. Nicos Hadjiscos, rich playboy, comes to the uncle’s house for a visit. Lacage’s aimt, Smaro Stefanidou, is ambitious to make the wealthy boy her son-in-law, but Hadjiscos has eyes only for Lacage whom he had met previously without knowing her identity. One day, he ask Lacage her advice on a new country home which he is building. After she looks at the blue¬ prints, she suggests that four steps to the front door would be sufficient, instead of the planned 10. Lacage is forced to leave her uncle’s home because she can’t get along with her aunt. Finding refuge in tiie home of a friend, she tries vainly to find a job. Desperate, she tries the idea of posing as a man in order to get work as a chauffeur for a rich man. Hadjiscos, having lost contact with Lacage, believes that she is in love with someone else. In desperation, he decides to marry Lacage’s cousin, Anna Kyriakou. However, with his financial difficulties, Kyriakou is no longer interested in him. He is forced to sell his new country home, which is bought without his knowledge by Lacage, who has become rich through an inheri¬ tance. He finds that it was not true that Lacage was in love with someone else, and rushes to her. He takes her to the country house, and shows her the four steps, as token of his love. Lacage, who has the key opens the door leading to their happiness. 3416 Servisection 4