Motion Picture Herald (Jul-Aug 1943)

July 24, 1943 MOTION PICTURE HERALD In This Week: SHOWMEN'S REVIEWS SHORT SUBJECTS RELEASE CHART BY COMPANIES THE RELEASE CHART Heaven Can Waif (Twentieth Century -Fox) Family Study, 1887-1942 Four generations of the Van Cleves, portrayed by a roster of players to crowd the most critical marquee, are herewith placed under producer-director Ernst Lubitsch's Technicolor microscope and examined with keen but kindly eye in a manner to amuse without amazing and entertain without lecturing the customers. The famed Lubitsch touches are present but the impish twisting of them has been foregone in the interest of narrative integrity and the family trade. The picture is, on this and all points, the best to come from the Lubitsch talent. The Van Cleves happen to be wealthy and New Yorkers, but they could be poor and live anywhere so far as the essence of the story is concerned, for the story is no more nor less than a recital of the domestic events in the life of the family, the romances, weddings, births, deaths, the vital statistics, so to speak, with emphasis on the characters of the members of the succeeding generations and with the making of the point that the passage of time— in this case taking a baby in arms through the stages that_ eventuate in death at 70— changes only the individuals, never the family unit. Samson Raphaelson's screenplay is to be praised for the ease with which it makes this point without descending at any time to the banal, the dull or the obvious. There is no war in the picture, although the period of it spans three of them. Neither is there a treatment of or reference to anything going on in the world outside the family circle of the Van Cleves. They are shown as what they are, neither all bad nor all good, and as doing what they do for reasons they consider sufficient, and the conclusions drawn— effectively registered by an opening and closing in which the central character, who believes he belongs in hell, is turned away from the gates of that place— is that the Van Cleves, and all families like them, are all right for paradise. The film is full of fine performances. Don Ameche is better than his past best as the principal Van Cleve, who progresses from irresponsible young manhood through responsible middle age to irresponsible venerability in the course of the picture. Gene Tierney establishes herself as an actress of ability and versatility in the role of his wife. Charles Coburn turns in a classic portrayal of the eldest Van Cleve and Allyn Joslyn is a standout as the Babbittish cousin. Marjorie Main and Eugene Pallette deliver serio-comic performances as Ameche's parents. Signe Hasso and Helene Reynolds contribute sparkling bits. _ The picture is escapist without being frivolous important without being significant, bright but Reviews This department deals with new product from the point of view of the exhibitor who is to purvey it to his own public. not shiny, a solid piece of entertainment that is nothing else but. Previewed at studio. Reviewer's rating : Excellent.— William R. Weaver. Release date, not set. Running time, 113 min. PCA No. 9073. General audience classification. Martha Gene Tierney Henry Van Cleve Don Ameche Hugo Van Cleve Charles Coburn Marjorie Main, Laird Cregar, Spring Byington, AJlyn Joslyn, Eugene Pallette, Signe Hasso, Louis Calhern, Helene Reynolds, Aubrey Mather, Michael Ames, Leonard Carey, Clarence Muse, Dickie Moore, Dickie Jones, Trudy Marshall, Florence Bates, Clara Blandick, Anita Bolster, Mino Pipitone, Jr., Claire Du Brey. Maureen Rodin-Ryan. Appointment in Berlin ( Columbia ) Spy Thriller This is a well composed and dressed, plausible and astonishingly objective spy thriller. Its casting, direction and photography are as responsible as the story for making this a strong supporting feature. Exploitation possibility of a sort is provided by the story's main character, a renegade Englishman who goes to Germany to broadcast for the Nazis, but who is really a secret agent and loyal servant of England. This could be Germany's Lord Haw-Haw, but probably isn't, inasmuch as Lord Haw-Haw (William Joyce) is indisputably a National Socialist. George Sanders gives a convincing and dashing performance as the cashiered English officer, ostensibly thirsting for revenge against his country, and Marguerite Chapman is alluring and sweet as the sister of the German director of communications, Onslow Stevens. Sanders ingratiates himself with Stevens, and becomes a famous German broadcasting character, telling "the truth" to Britons about their "shameful" leaders. But the truth about German atrocities percolates to Chapman, who aids her brother in radio ; and she secretly abhors Nazism, and also Sanders, for his treachery. It is when the Gestapo becomes aware of Sanders' undercover accomplices that she sympathizes with him. For then he discloses his identity, knocks out Stevens, flees with Chapman to the Dutch border. He has with him information about a German invasion of England. But they are intercepted; Chapman is shot dead by her brother; Sanders jumps into an airplane, sends the message by plane radio, then is shot and crashes to death. Samuel Bischoff produced, with Alfred Green directing, from a story by B. F. Fineman, transcribed for the screen by Horace McCoy and Michael Hogan. Seen at the Rialto theatre, New York, on a weekday^ evening, with a predominantly masculine audience which evinced no reaction in view of the picture's lack of comedy. Reviewer's Rating : Good. — Floyd Stone. Release date, July 15, 1943. Running time, 77 mins. PCA No. 9053. General audience classification. Keith Wilson George Sanders Sse, P^15511^ Marguerite Chapman Rudolph Preissmg Onslow Stevens Gretta Van Leyden Gale Sondergaard Alan Napier, H. P. Sanders, Don Douglas, Jack Lee, Alec Craig, Leonard Mudie, Frederic Worlock, Steve Geray, Wolfgang A. Zilzer. For Whom the Bell Tolls ( Paramount ) Love and War in Spain [Rewritten from last week's Herald] Breathing the spirit and mirroring the fidelity and content of the widely-circulated novel from which it has been drawn, "For Whom the Bell Tolls" emerges among the giants of the screen. It will assume such stature as an attraction. This long-anticipated $3,000,000 effort reveals sweep, scale, performance, superb production and direction at the hands of Sam Wood and magnificent camera work under the guidance of Ray Rennahan. Where Ernest Hemingway painted detailed word pictures of his principal characters so, too, did Dudley Nichols remain faithful to these delineations in script and Wood in bringing the script to life. Out of that comes full-bodied portraitures, all of them memorable in their etched clarity and one memorable above all others. She is Katina Paxinou, who plays Pilar, woman of the mountains. In this, her first role in an American-made picture, Miss Paxinou propels herself to the very forefront of dramatic actresses through an extraordinary ability to convey indomitableness of will, strength of conviction, granite-like courage and unflinching loyalty to a cause for which she is prepared to die. Her performance overwhelms all others in a fine cast, and that is saying a great deal. For, in this attraction as well is Gary Cooper as Robert Jordan, the Montanan who dynamites trains and bridges for the Republican Army of Spain because he is following a destiny which his conscience and his beliefs dictate he must. There is Ingrid Bergman, daughter of a Republican mayor and eyewitness to her parents' assassination by the Nationalist forces and who herself had been raped by soldiers of that army. Both of them are in the heroic pattern and in romantic characterizations which reflect perfect casting. There are also Akim Tamiroff as Pablo, Product Digest Section 1 44 1