The Film Spectator (Mar-Dec 1928)

Page Ten THE FILM SPECTATOR June 23, 1928 liams, Nils Aster, Huntly Gordon, Dorothy Cummings and Edward Nugent. I understand that this is Nugent's first picture. He will be heard from. It was good to get even a brief glimpse of Huntly Gordon, who I hope has returned to the screen to stay. We can do with a few more of his well-bred type. Our Dancing Daughters is a picture that is going to give satisfaction to the majority of those who see it, and no exhibitor need be backward about booking it. I am going to find some faults with it, but they are the sort that have no great effect on its entertainment value. It has several large close-ups of people kissing, quite the most vulgar manifestation of a rather vulgar and lowbrow art. A director who can't tell a story without using half-clad young girls and huge close-ups of clinging lips should be in a business that lends itself more appropriately to the exploitation of vulgarity. Screen art would be quite refined and decent if most of those in it now were out of it. One veteran mistake that Beaumont makes is having some of the characters in a scene fail to react to what others in the same scene are doing. The host and hostess at a party have to register their feelings in a way that the audience will get, but guests in the scenes with them notice nothing. Although the entire picture deals with sophisticated people of the upper social level, Johnny Brown comes to dance in a business suit. Every other man at the function is attired properly. The defense for Brown's outfit undoubtedly will be that he was very much disturbed about his love affairs and that it was desirable to show him too absorbed in his troubles to think of putting on his evening clothes. This absurd reasoning governs scenes in many pictures. A character such as Brown plays could be worried so much that he would stay away from a social function, but he would have to lose his mind completely before he would attend one in a business suit. To people used to dress suits, wearing one or not wearing one is not a matter that taxes the mind. It is a habit dictated by good taste, and good taste is something that a gentleman can not forget under any circumstances whatever. To characterize a hero as being so troubled as to forget good taste is a confession that those responsible for the characterization don't know what good taste is. * * * Major Credit Goes to Miss Beryl Mercer ONE thing I can't understand about most of the metropolitan picture reviewers is the unanimity with which they jump on pictures that have some human interest in them. "Hokum!" they cry, and they refuse to tolerate the hokum no matter how well it is done. Personally I believe that hokum is the best screen material we have. I love it. The fact that no picture with good hokum in it ever fails at the box-office indicates that a whole lot of people agree with me. As a matter of fact, I think it requires more brains to direct hokum than it does to handle scenes free from it. The director who can wave the fiag in some new way that brings a lump to the throat is doing something bigger than the director does who interests us in something we never saw before. Ted Sloman deserves the greatest credit for making We Americans such a good picture. He had to make it out of old stuff, and he makes us like it. He uses close-ups only where they are needed, and shows us some striking groups that bring out the drama in scenes better by the arrangement of the characters than could be done by showing us large close-ups of facial expressions. But I am not going to give Sloman all the credit for the success of We Americans, nor will I give the credit to the hokum in it. If we subject this picture to a searching analysis I think we will discover that it is made by Beryl Mercer. She plays the wife of George Sidney and the mother of Patsy Ruth Miller and George Lrewis; there are many other notable names in the cast, but this little bit of a woman moves through the picture as its dominant force. She's all hokum — just a human, sweet little mother who always can be counted on to remain cool and kind and compassionate no matter what happens. Her reaction when she learns that her son was killed in France is a fine bit of acting. I understand this is Miss Jlercer's first picture. She has ability and a screen personality that should make her a tremendous success. I think that if I could see Theodore Roberts and her playing man and wife I would be content, no maTter how punk the rest of the picture was. All the members of the long We Americans cast do well. Al Cohn made good jobs of the adaptation and continuity, but was faced with the usual difficulty of having to write seven reels out of about five reels of action, the result being that the story takes some time to get under way. Al Cohn is a lazy devil when it comes to filling his advertising space in The Spectator, but as a writer of nice sentiment, and feelings, and honest emotions, and checks to pay for his advertising space, he is one of the most satisfactory screen authors in Hollj^vood. Ted Sloman indulges in that major vulgarity: a huge close-up of a kiss, something that never, under any circumstances, is justified. It never has story value, and always is the height of poor taste. A kiss on the screen should suggest the sentiment that surrounds it in real life. The parties to it usually seek privacy, something that always should be suggested when we see it in a picture. The weakness of most of our directors is that they have no souls. They should concern themselves more than they do with the spirit of a scene. They give all their attention to the physical side of it and none to the thought back of it. The greatest contributions to KENNETH ALEXANDER Spe< icial Art Stills Production Stills 5th Avenue Portraiture 1927-28 Engagements For D. W. Griffith "Drums of Love" "Battle of the Sexes" For Samuel Goldwyn, Inc. "The Two Lovers" "The Awakening" "The Rescue" Available on or before July 30 for suitable engagement Address 6685 Hollywood Blvd., HO. 8443