Exhibitors Herald and Moving Picture World (Apr-Jun 1930)

32 EXHIBITORS HERALD-WORLD May 3, 1930 \ U t( W SERVICE ON PICTURES — ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT SPECTACULAR! Produced and distributed by Universal. Directed by Lewis Milestone. Story by Erich Maria Remarque. Screen play by George Abbott and Maxwell Anderson. Continuity by Del Andrews. Film Editor , Maurice Pivar. Supervising story chief , C. Gardner Sullivan. Musical score by David Broekman. With Lew Ayres, William Bakewell , Louis Wolheim, John Wray, Slim Summerville, Russell Gleason, Walter Rogers, Ben Alexander , Owen Davis, Jr., Heine Conklin, Arnold Lucy, Scott Kolk, Edwin Maxwell, Pat Collins, Richard Alexander , Joan Marsh, Beryl Mercer, Bodil Rosing, Lucille Powers, Yola D'Avril, Poupee Androit, Bertha Mann. Photographed by Arthur Edeson. Seen by DOUGLAS HODGES in Hollywood It’S a spectacular thing. It’s not propaganda that will encourage or enhance belligerence. Universal expects it to have the opposite effect. And, although I rarely believe that any kind of propaganda is effective when it comes to avoiding a good healthy war, I rather think this picture would keep America out of one for a week longer anyhow. A lot of people get killed in one week so that makes the picture worthwhile, you see. It’s a vital and horrible kind of entertainment. The entire cast of heroes — about nine of them — are killed. All that is left at the end of the show is a lot of fertilizer. But it’s fibre is fine and its spirit is beautiful. It’s a unique kind of show and one that will probably remain unparallelled. It’s fineness is chiefly in the characters of those young German boys who left their schoolroom courageously to fight for what they thought was patriotism. Later they learned they were fighting for the protection of wealth and commerce. Yet they continued to fight and die. The best role of the story (Paul) is played by Lew Ayres, a charming young fellow, without whom the show could not possibly have been so good. SHORT FEATURES r Three short comedies produced and distributed by Educational: the Terry Toon, ** Indian Pudding,** the Lloyd Hamilton **Follow the Swallow,** and the Mack Sennett ''Honeymoon Zeppelin.** Seen by DOUGLAS FOX in New York Of these three comedies the Terry Toon, the least expensive to produce, and probably the shortest, is easily the best on the entertainment side. While not highly original it is competently and amusingly done and introduces two new characters, a perfectly grand moose, of which you only get a glimpse, and a most ferocious looking buffalo. Villains are the Indians, hero is a cowboy mouse. In “Follow the Swallow” the comedian’s offspring swallows a coupon at a fair, the coupon entitling its holder to a new car. Hamilton resorts to castor oil with the closing line “it won’t be long now.” “Honeymoon Zeppelin” probably cost a lot of money to make and includes some stunts which appear to be dangerous such as the transfer from an airplane to a blimp at speed. The director, however, to get a laugh, resorts to having a character stutter, something that even the burlesque houses have dropped. Redeeming feature is Daphne Pollard, swell comedienne, in a minor role. By T. O. Service HERO OF THE WEEK CLIFF BROUGHTON , whose first picture as associate producer for Sono-Art will be "Rogue of the Rio Grande** by Oliver Drake. Broughton then will make six outdoor films featuring Bill Cody. SAFETY IN NUMBERS SNAPPY ! Produced and distributed by Paramount. Directed by Victor Schertzinger. Story by George Marion and Percy Heath. Music by George Marion and Richard Whiting . With Buddy Rogers, Carol Lombard, Kathryn Crawford, Josephine Dunn, Geneva Mitchell , Roscoe Karns, Francis MacDonald, Virginia Bruce , Lawrence Grant , Louise Beavers and Richard Tucker. Seen by DOUGLAS HODGES in Hollywood ITHOUT much of a story to start with Victor Schertzinger has collected a capable cast and selected (or wrote) a number of good songs and there you are! You can’t say it’s his best picture; you know darn well that wouldn’t be fair to him. But he shook the wrinkles out of the story and turned out a picture that is clever, snappy, entertaining and fairly humorous. The heir to $25,000 goes to New York to get acquainted with the best people and learn how to live safely among the parasites of the big town. He is naturally a great success. His ridiculous position is that he is the guest of three charming follies girls who protect him from vampires and witchcraft. He is their guest even in that he lives with them in their apartment (which is pretty witchy itself). The entire story is thick with chorus girls, singers and dancers. HOLD EVERYTHING AS FINE AS YOU’LL SEE. Produced and distributed by Warner Brothers. With Winnie Lightner, Joe E. Brown, Sally O'Neil, Dorothy Revier , Georges Carpentier, Bert Roach, Edmund Breese. Length , 7,206 feet. Release , May 1, 1930. Seen by PETER VISCHER in New York ' 1' HE new Warner Brothers picture “Hold Everything,” with which the handsome Hollywood theatre was opened on Broadway, is as fine a piece of entertainment as you’ll ever see on the screen. The picture is bright and cheery, hilariously funny, exciting, with good music and some splendid scenes in color. I don’t know what more you could ask for. The picture is, of course, a screen version of that screaming comedy that held the boards in New York for months on end. Joe E. Brown does a fine piece of work in the role of the principal comic, a second-rate prize fighter. Winnie Lightner is his foil, and a whole-souled robust gal she is. Georges Carpentier, once the idol of France, is the hero, and Sally O’Neil the charming heroine. Believe me, when I say Joe E. Brown is good I mean it. I am as loud and vociferous a rooter for Bert Lahr as there is in this fair land of ours and the mere thought of anybody, let alone Joe E. Brown, attempting the role Lahr played so gorgeously on the stage made me a little ill. Frankly, if this picture hadn’t opened a new theatre I wouldn’t have gone; I like Lahr and I want my Lahr neat, without imitations. Now I apologize; I think Brown was swell and I’ll wave a flag for him any day. There’s one scene in this picture that’s so gobd I can’t understand why it didn’t earn special billing. I refer to the fight scene in which Carpentier goes to it with some mug, in Magnascope. Boy, this is a neat bit, with the rat-a-tat-tat of Carpentier’s gloves making the prettiest music you ever heard out of a loudspeaker. This is a picture than can win anybody’s whole-hearted applause. DOUBLE CROSS ROADS CROOKED ! Produced and distributed by Fox. Directed by Alfred Werker. Story from Walter Lipman's “ Yonder Grow the Daisies.** Adaptation by Howard Eslabrook and George Brooks. Dialog by Howard Estabrook. Photography by Joseph August, Sol Halperin. Cast: Robert Ames , Lila Lee, Montagu Love, Edythe Chapman, Ned Sparks, Tom Jackson, William V. Mong. Footage, 5,800. Release, April 20. Seen by DOUGLAS FOX in New York Y OU couldn’t get more crookedness into a picture than is crammed into “Double Cross Roads,” melodrama of the underworld. But fine direction and good acting on the part of the principals save the film from being entirely of the dime novel variety. The hero gets out of jail, half determined to go straight. To make up his mind about it he goes to an up country village and falls in love with a girl he takes to be a country lass. He tells her about himself, but that makes no difference to her and they decide to get married. Meanwhile the boss has been putting pressure on him to do a job at a big country house nearby. He refuses until he meets the girl with the boss and learns that she’s one of the gang, too. From then on there is so much double cross