The Film Daily (1937)

THE Monday, March 22, 1937 A A TUvUm 6$ tke> View TUms "Her Husband's Secretary" with Jean Muir, Beverly Roberts, Warren Hull Warners 60 Mins. ENTERTAINING VARIATION ON WIFE VERSUS SECRETARY THEME CARRIES POP APPEAL. Some neat twists in the plot of boymeets-two-girls are given in this number. Jean Muir is the secretary who marries the son of a rich construction magnate without knowing that he is anything but the poor construction laborer he professes to be. Taking over the father's business on his death, the husband is all wrapped up in his wife. Then she places her best friend in her hubby's office as his secretary. And the trouble begins. It is cleverly worked up by gradual stages to the point where the designing secretary has the husband all enmeshed in her coils. A business trip out of town with the sec going along to attend to business details starts the fireworks. The wife follows, finds them in a cabin and assumes the worst, with no proof that anything wrong has taken place. But hubby comes to his senses just as wifie is ready to quit. This simple outline of the plot does not reveal the many clever and intriguing twists that are worked in to build the emotional suspense. All three principals turn in fine portrayals. The direction is clever and deft throughout. This offering will please the average femme, especially the wives whose husbands happen to have secretaries. Cast: Jean Muir, Beverly Roberts, Warren Hull, Joseph Crehan, Clara Biandick, Addison Richards, Harry Davenport, Gordon Hart, Minerva Urecal, Pauline Garon, Stuart Holmes. Director, Frank McDonald; Author, Crane Wilbur; Screenplay, Li I Me Hayward. Direction, Very Good. Photography, Okay. SHORTS i "Who's Who" No Who's Who Pictures 21 mins. Personality Stuff A very interesting compilation of newsreel shots of front-page news events that have occurred in recent years, each subject built up by clever editing into an entertaining story. This is the first of a series which will treat four prominent world figures in this manner. In this reel the achievements are presented of leaders in public life, science, sports and arts. In the order named they are Stanley Baldwin, the great British diplomat; Albert Einstein, Helen Wills and Will Rogers. The film was directed by John M. Leman. Music by Felix R. Mendelssohn. The commentator is Ben Grauer, who does a very fine job and keeps the subject matter always entertaining by his lively comments. "The Star Reporter" (Headliners No. 2) Paramount 9 mins. Talent Display Again Ted Husing poses as the Star Reporter, and shows why the big names are able to stay that "Her Husband Lies' with Gail Patrick, Ricardo Cortez, Akim Tamiroff, Tom Brown, Louis Calhern Paramount 76 mins. UNDERWORLD DRAMA WHOSE EXCITING CLIMAX, SWIFT PACE AND ACTING WILL APPEAL TO ADULT PATRONS. There's punch aplenty in this well produced story of the sacrifice a top-flight New York gambler, — a role skillfully and smoothly played by Ricardo Cortez, — makes to save his young brother from embracing this same "profession." The latter, in the person of Tom Brown, comes to Manhattan from Seattle, to play for big time stakes, having run the ten grand Cortez sent him as a wedding gift, when he married June Martel, to five times the original sum. Brown does not know that his older brother is the big shot in the entire racket, and when he finds out this fact in the picture's climax scenes, there is considerable excitement and drama. Cortez arranges to get the city's ace gamblers to "clean'' the kid, hoping that his loss of the entire $50,000 will cure him of his appetite for cards. But the kid wins. The gamblers believe Cortez has double-crossed them, and finally he joins the game, but again his young brother wins. In the desperate hope of winning the final, huge pot, Cortez cheats on the deal. This act puts him on the spot, with the result that the gamblers' trigger men kill him; but not until he has squared himself with his young brother who is definitely cured of gambling and heads back to Seattle and happiness with June Martel. Gail Patrick, as Cortez' beautiful wife who tries to make him go straight, has the feminine lead in this swiftly paced production, and gives a rousing performance. Men and women patrons will enjoy this film, as there is high entertainment in it for both sexes. Akim Tamiroff is excellent as the sinister, rival gambler. So is Tom Brown. Besides being well acted, the footage is capably photographed by Leon Shamroy. Edward Ludwig's direction is fine. Cast: Gail Patrick, Ricardo Cortez, Akim Tamiroff, Tom Brown, Louis Calhern, June Martel, Dorothy Peterson, Ralf Harolde, Adrian Morris, Ray Walker, Jack La Rue, Bradley Page. Producer, B. P. Schulberg; Director, Edward Ludwig; Author, Oliver H. P. Garrett; Screenplay, Wallace Smith, Eve Greene; Cameraman, Leon Shamroy; Editor, Robert Bischoff. Direction, Fine. Photography, Capable. way. Stanley Worth, young ballad singer, does a number accompanied by the Lopez ork. Then the Boswell Sisters, singing "Heebie Jeebie Blues," put over with their usual snap. Then a tap star is brought forth, Jack Blair, who crashed over in "New Faces." Finishes with Yasha Bunchuk and his Cossack Choir. Nice diversity that scores. England Prepares For the Coronation Henry Maston Productions 11 mins. Interesting In addition to its interesting and timely contents, this short has an advantage to exhibitors in that it can be shown as an individual sub Bill Cracks Down with Grant Withers, Beatrice Roberts, Ranny Weeks Republic 63 mins. MECHANICAL STORY MOVES ALONG WITHOUT INSPIRATION AND FAILS TO IMPRESS. This turns out to be a very dull hour of screen entertainment, due principally to the fact that the story material is dull and flatly presented, and moves along without any particular tempo or highlights to lift it out of the conventional rut. It involves a youth (Ranny Weeks) who is supposed to inherit his father's steel mill. But the dying father has placed in the will a proviso that the son must prove his worth by working in the mill for one year. Meanwhile the foreman (Grant Withers) is to manage the mill for that year, and then decide at the end whether the boy is to inherit the steel mill. Given such a loose start, you can't expect the production to develop anything much. It doesn't. This Ranny Weeks shows nothing that warrants putting him in the featured spot, just a pleasant young fellow without any acting ability that could be discovered in an hour's workout. Grant Withers and the girl attractions — Beatrice Roberts and Judith Allen — worked conscientiously with parts that did not ring very convincing. The youth goes to work in the steel mill, falls in love with the girl that the foreman would like to marry, and the two men become further involved with another girl mixing in. At the end when it is all unscrambled the foreman gets the girl, the rich lad the society girl who was after him in the first place, and all is happy as the hero and plant owner cuts his foremanmanager in for half the mill. Just like that. Cast: Grant Withers, Beatrice Roberts, Ranny Weeks, Judith Allen, William Newell, Pierre Watkin, Robert Williams, Georgia Caine, Greta Meyer, Edgar Norton, Harry Depp, Eugene King, Landers Stevens, Eddie Anderson. Producer, William Berke; Director, William Nigh; Authors, Owen Francis, Morgan Cox; Screenplay, Dorrell McGowan, Stuart McGowan; Cameraman, William Nobles. Direction, Fair. Photography, Good. ject, or used as an addenda to newsreel footage. Not only do its scenes show the British crown jewels and the sundry magnificent ceremonial objects to be used in the forthcoming Coronation of George VI and his Queen, but Henry Maston has incorporated much valuable atmospheric material which serves to inform, impress and entertain audiences with the romantic and historical aspects of the event. He has also caught with the camera that intangible air of expectancy which pervades England at the present time. The narration is uncommonly effective, the sequences nicely paced, and at the finish of this diverting short is an unusual bit of camera work of the sun piercing the murk and mist of an English landscape. This concluding scene is a symbol of the happy ending to Britain's recent constitutional crisis. A IGN A "DENARA E D'AMORE ("Money And Love"), Italian dialogue film with English sub-titles; a Capitani Film; produced by Cines Studios; story by Luigi Bonelli and Ivo Perilli; directed by Guido Brignone, with Elsa Merlini, Amedeo Mazzari, Maurizio D'Ancora, Ermanno Roveri, et al, in the cast. Presented at the Broadway Theater. Without question this is the best allaround feature to come out of Italy in many months. It is played by a highly skilled cast. The photography is top-notch, and so is the direction. It is fantastic with a degree of probability; brims with drama, sophisticated dialogue and contains copious contrasting humor. English sub-titles will enable American audiences to enjoy the story which tells of a girl forced into a distasteful marriage; her falling into a trance after the ceremony, being pronounced dead and relegated to a tomb. Her trance terminates and she disappears, seeking refuge finally with a lover whom, it is assumed she eventually weds. "STANDCHUTZE BRUGGLER" ((Sharpshooter Bruggler"), German dialogue film with English sub-titles; a Ufa Tonfilm production; directed by Werner Klingler, with Ludwig Kerscher, Franziska Kinz, Rolf Pinegger, et al, in the cast. Presented at the 86th Street Garden Theater. An exceptionally fine picture, magnificently photographed, whose sub-titles in English make it thoroughly understandable. The story deals with the experiences of a young soldier who is wounded on patrol duty in the Tyrol, and recuperates at the castle of a baroness whose attitude toward him appears far more than sisterly. But he rejoins his regiment, is decorated for bravery and devotes his life to the army. Scenes in the fastnesses of the Alps, where the campaign is waged during the World War, are spectacular, thrilling and excessively beautiful. "HOGUERAS EN LA NOCHE" ("Bonfires in the Night"), dialogue film in Spanish; a Jose Balart production; directed by Arturo Porchet, with Carmen Rodriguez, Jose Lado, Jose Telmo, Carmencita Elios, et al, in the cast. Presented at the Teatro Cervantes. Recently imported from Barcelona, this melodrama, whose comedy is supplied by Luis Villasiul, recounts the complications arising from the return of Carmen Rodriguez' girlhood sweetheart, whose brother she has married. The erstwhile lover makes matters unpleasant by producing a sheaf of incriminating letters written in the long ago, but there is justice in the fates, for the trouble maker is run over by a train. Film is well acted and fairly good technically. Equity Nominating Com. New Equity nominating committee which will pick the regular slate of officers for election in May includes Josephine Hull, Ruth Hammond, Mathias Briggs, Lucile Watson, Jimmy Durante and Ernest Truex. Re-nomination of Frank Gillmore as president and Paul Dullzell as executive secretary is held assured.