Exhibitors Herald (1927)

34 EXHIBITORS HERALD December 31, 1927 rHIS department contains news, information and gossip on current productions. It aims to supply service which will assist the exhibitor in kee ping in touch with developments in connection with pictures and picture personalities — and what these are doing at the box office. No prophecies on the entertainment value of pictures are made. Opinions expressed are simply those of the author or of his contributors and the reader is requested to consider them only as such. — EDITOR’S NOTE. “HER WILD OAT” It isn't often that three so perfectly attuned intellects are brought to bear upon a single project as those of Colleen Moore, John McCormick and Marshall Neilan, but when that circumstance does unravel from the curiously twisting skein of destiny the result, invariably, is a “Her Wild Oat.’1 For such a result the frequently less happy tanglings and twistings of the skein may well be borne with. A couple of huzzahs, please, from the pleased picturegoers. This “Her Wild Oat” is quite like the Colleen Moore picture and yet quite as unlike it. In the little lady with the big following is quite plainly the gay citizeness you know her to be, without ostentation and without effort. They give her a curb caravansary to toy with this time, and Larry .Kent to boy with, out of which combination she extracts more merriment than a lesser comedienne under less formidable auspices might take from the collected works of Charles Hoyt, Ralph Spence and Will Rogers. Laughs, smiles and chuckles are tossed into the run of the reels with consumate carelessness. The several of these patently manufactured on the set and jotted down on the cuff, if anywhere, are quite naturally the funniest. The picture gains rather than loses by the impression given that the three decidedly Celtic individuals previously named are enjoying themselves immensely while the camera spins its web (poetic indulgenge apropos of the season) and I herewith launch and begin exploitation of a campaign to increase the Irish influence in Hollywood. But what you want to know, of course, is whether the people in the theatre laughed and whether there were many people in the theatre and what their attitude toward the picture seemed to be. Yes, the people did laugh, and yes, there were many of them, and their attitude seemed to be just about that highly profitable attitude which sings a song of six-pence in the ear of the observant exhibitor. By which I do not mean to predict (see Italic type at top of page) that “Her Wild Oat” will or will not make you a dime, but by which I do mean to proclaim that, if it doesn’t a good idea would be to trade the theatre property for a part interest in the local Ford privilege. By T. O. SERVICE “IN OLD KENTUCKY ” I HAVE seen “In Old Kentucky” in so many different places, in so many different forms and in so many different ages, that I went to the Oriental last week under pressure and with loud protest. It simply wasn’t in the cards that I should stay awake through still another version of it — but it was in the picture. Yes sir, and this version is the best of aU the versions I have seen, on stage or screen, and that’s a flock of ’em. I don’t know how much of the old story you’ll miss, nor how you’ll like the new parts that have been installed in it, but if you don’t steam up over the race finish, and if you don’t crack a rib at the comedy supplied by three negroes who steal the show for important intervals, its quite too bad for comment. If, as I say, these things don’t get you, one of us is wrong and I suspect you. They’re shipshape showmanship. The use of these colored folks in this picture is a factor to be considered in various ways. Their comedy, strictly racial stuff, is perfect. I believe it would be possible to extract from the print these scenes in which their stuff clicks and assemble a short picture that would be funnier than anything now available in the lesser lengths. And I believe that a long picture made up of this and similar comedy by these same people, with suitable support, would be funnier than any of the long comedies we’ve been getting. So much for the purely technical and structural side of the thing. (On the other side there is only the remark of the old lady who sat back of me, apparently a visitor to these Thompsonian parts, which has no bearing upon the case but may have echoes if the hinterland is what it used to be, which I doubt.) “In Old Kentucky,” I repeat, is the best “In Old Kentucky” that I’ve ever seen and I’ve seen plenty. It is so good that I don’t remember any player in it as being better than the others, which is about the last word in something or other that I’m sure is important. “SEVENTH HEAVEN” It is with a shock, not to say a knockout blow, that I record Mr. J. C. Jenkins’ dissent from my recently written opinion of “Seventh Heaven.” Mr. Jenkins’ opinion to the contrary appeared in “Elis Colyum” of the issue preceding this. It leaves me in a quandary, whatever that is, for I have always held Mr. Jenkins’ judgment in high esteem, despite the fact that he gave up a perfectly good and stationary home in Neligh. Neb., to drive from end to end of this continent in search of that rare specie, the bird who doesn’t take the HERALD. Maybe the despair of seeking such an animal has embittered the gentleman, but he didn’t look that way last time he dropped in to trade fictionettes with me. Anyway — As I recall my somewhat extended comments on “Seventh Heaven,” I stated that I expected to see some 49 pictures of less merit before I should see another so good. I believe I backed this up with figures having to do with the mean annual expenditure for pictorial scrutiny. And, I blush to remember, I volunteered to write a poem, one of the rare samples of my Muse, for each person who should disagree with me that “Seventh Heaven” is about the best picture of even date. I hate to suspect that Mr. Jenkins merely wants to see my lyric faculty at its best; in fact, I refuse to permit myself to credit that theory for a moment, and so there’s nothing for it but to break out the rhyming dictionary and go to it. It will be recalled that I reserved the right to select my own topic, and so here goes: If I held for the screen a grudge As black as H. L. Mencken’s I still would be a better judge Of films than J. C. Jenkins. So there — now — Jaysee. See what you went and did? Maybe you’ll think twice before you start another argument with this versificatin’ apparatus of mine. Leastwise I hope you will, ’cause that ’ere jingle contains the only other word in all the languages I know that rhymes with Jenkins, and if I had to write another one of these things it’d be just too bad. Come on, Jaysee, ’fess up and tell the folks that “Seventh Heaven” is a whale of a picture and you were just kiddin’. Start the New Year with a clean slate, as well as a clean plate, and we’ll let bygones be bygones just as though nothin’ had happened.