Motion Picture Magazine (Mar-Jul 1918)

MOTION PICTURF II MAGAZINE L' LEARN HUSK PLAY by note Piino Orgin Violin Comet Guilir Banjo Mandolin Harp *CeHo Trombone Hute Clarinet Piccolo Saxophone Ukelele Sight Singing AT HONE! Iconise Bowlea, Epwortb. Va., writes : Received my teacher's certificate. I htehly recommend your school and wouldn't take ADythinsforthe help it has given met" Music no longer difficult! New plan makes it easy to learnbyhomostudy. Positively easier than with private teacher. Faster progress. You will be able to play your favorite instrument in a few short months! More than 200.000 men, women and children have learned by our method. You, too, can learn in your spare time. We guarantee it. Lessons FREE locality at once to help advertise our home study method. For a short time, therefore, we offer our marvelous lessons FREE. Only charge i* for postagre and sheetmuslc— averaging only 12 1 -'2 cents weekly. Bejcianers or advanced pupils Write for amazing free book givlntf all the facts and particulars. Send a postal today! II. S. SCHOOL OF MUSIC £04 Brunswick Bldg. New York City H. S. Whltt mack , New York writes:"] compliment you on your wonderful system. Did not know one note from another, but in a short time have mastered the piano and am now composing ' C.N. Pitta. Macon. Ga., writes: "Have completed your courseon violin. Now have 16 students." LEAPN PERSONAL CULTURE PERFECT YOUR BEAUTY EARN BIG MONEY I Beautify the Complexion SURELY, QUICKLY Nadinola Cream The Supreme Beauty Requisite Used and Endorsed by Thousands NADTNOLAbamshestan, freckles, pimples, liverspots, etc., extreme cases. Rids pores and tissues of impurities. Leaves the skin clear, soft, healthy. Directions and guarantee in package. By toilet counters or mail, two sizes, SO cents and $1.00. Address Dept. M.P. NATIONAL TOILET COMPANY, Paris, Tom. 3 If own aud <*w u dtuuuj brings you the superb Rex Visible Typewriter— an im< proved typewriter— exceptionally strong and durable— extra wide carriage— the only typewriter with the Shock Absorber.Guaranteed by the American Can Company. Write at 1 Ampriran AHnineMachinel »nce! , Send for our offer and big free SPSSSlSOTSSSri boolt-!B ao «ducatwo ln typewriter.. Total price$44. 60 Used TypewriUrand Adding Machine Div. by U.S. Gov't. WnfjuaJ American Can Co.Dept. \ 4 Chicago 10 WAR SONGS FOR 10c Our Boys on the Fields of Battle are singing them. Our Sailors on the Sea Fighters and the Boys in Training Camps; everyone is wild over them. THE LATEST WAR HITS, such as Over There; Where Do We Go From Here; I May Be Gone for a Long. Long Time; Answer Mr. Wilson's Call; Good-bye Broadway, Hello France; It's a Long Way to Berlin; Somewhere in France; We're Going Over; Send Me Away With a Smile; When the Boys Come Home; and 100 others. All for 10 cts. and 2 cts. postage. PIKE PUB. CO., Dept. 16, So. Norwalk, Conn. STOP Stammering We can cure you. Write today for free /-^ book "How to Stop Stammering." S. H. Robbins, Prin., Boston ( | Stammerers' Institute, 246 Huntington Ave., Boston, Mass. 0 124 called "The Frozen Doughnut," or something equally as sensible, compares very favorably with the justly famous Donnybrook Fair. It chronicles the adventures of a good burglar, who is designated by a sacred lizard to get a mysterious diamond from Pearl, which diamond has, of course, been stolen in Arabia or some such place. The good burglar has a lovely set of manners, but his brother members of the Order of the Lizard are not so refined. While he is trying to pinch the diamond in a polite, gentlemanly fashion, his roughneck lodge brothers are continually prowling around, possibly to see that he doesn't find a second father in his uncle and hock the ice. These birds are done up like Black Handers are supposed to look, and ever and anon (mostly the latter) one of them is discovered hiding in the refrigerator or the bathtub. After a realistic struggle, in the course of which they smash seven or eight Louis XIV chairs (made in Grand Rapids), our hero beats up about a dozen men, not counting the three he knocked out of the window with one swing of his mighty right arm. As it is only the first reel, he lets them escape with the warning that if they repeat the offense in the second reel he wont be so lenient. Rough-house tactics prevail, however, and such drastic measures as massaging a gent's skull with a chair are employed by our hero — all to no avail. Tony, the five-cent barber, and his murderous gang of $1.50 per day supers are not to be deterred by mere love-taps. Seeing that their game wont work, they write Pearl a letter, giving her fifteen days to settle her earthly affairs, unless she comes across with the diamond. Instead of using the post-office, the gang use the most approved dime-novel method of getting their letter to Pearl. They take an efficient-looking dagger, stick it in the letter and throw it in Pearl's window. Fearl evinces no surprise whatever at this playful little jest. You see, Pearl has acted in series before, and is aware of the fact that first-class union assassins never have the price of a two-cent stamp. The profession has been hit hard by the war. Serial thrillers may be interesting enough for people who want excitement and who are not endowed with a sense of humor. Speaking for myself, such pictures remind me forcibly of the old Keystone slapstick stuff. And why, oh, why, should anybody who wants to see a scrap spend a dime when he can see just as good in 'most any livery stable for nothing? P. F. Leahy, 245 East Second Street, North, Portland, Ore., is with us again. Brother Leahy has the uncommon faculty of waiting until he has something to say, and then saying it with a big bang. His present criticism is highly justifiable: Douglas Fairbanks' stories are all cut out of the same piece of goods with only a slightly different pattern. William S. Hart is always the bad two-gun man who is reformed or the good two-gun man who is the reformer. Mary Pickford still fluffs, smiles, pouts, shakes her curls and stamps her feet thruout more or fewer reels. Why cant they give her a real, grown-up debutante part, like the Little American, but more original and with more plot? She is a clever little actress or was, unless it has been smothered out of her by tiresome stories. "Poor Paul ine" Frederick has been treated nearly as badly, altho there is more interest and suspense in her plays than in "Little Mary's." Miss Frederick is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful and most forceful actresses yet screened, and it is next to a crime to waste her beauty and talents. Norma Talmadge? Well, you know I always have had a large, warm spot in my heart for that young lady ever since her "bit" days with Vitagraph. She is simply wonderful. She has beauty — more than enough. She has remarkable ability and versatility, and she has youth. I would rather see Miss Talmadge than any other two stars. Her personality is the most pleasing and the most gripping of them all. Now, there are several names that are immense drawing cards, and yet they have not been "starred." Personally, I hope they never are. They are getting good material now and are not "one-part" performers. I refer chiefly to Tom Moore, Harry Morey, Frank Losee, Adele De Garde and others. Tom Moore is splendid; there is no other word describes him. He has splendid appearance, ability, personality and he makes one feel as if he were an old friend. He is real and the most natural of them all. He may not be so versatile as Harry Morey, who is strong in any character, but Tom Moore is such a boyish, wholesome sort of a person. You hear people say (I have said it myself) : "Oh, I'm sick and tired of Fairbanks, or Hart, or Marguerite Clark." Well, thsy dont mean exactly that — I know I dont. We are tired of the sameness in their pictures. They are as clever as they ever were, more so probably, for there is such a thing as advancement even for stars, but they have no opportunity to show such development. The lutle one-reelers that Mary Pickford used to do in the Biograph days were gems, even tho they would appear crude today, but they gave her a chance to vary her characterization. She would be a little Indian girl once, a "mender of nets" in another, a more or less grown-up person in another and so on. It is true with all the others, tho they are not such pioneers as she in that field. Fairbanks was a star from the start, and I dont know but that is a handicap. All the public has seen him do on the screen is climb buildings, jump fences and grin. He must be able to do other things. Dont you, Mr. Editor, think I am right? I should think the producers or the directors would "get wise to themselves" and figure out something to put new life into their releases. Out of the hundreds of scenarios they must receive daily, I'll bet you I could pick out stories, tho perhaps they'd need remodeling: and pruning, would still be worth while. Thev should give the public a little change. They figure that because some one has made a hit in a certain sort of part, that is what the public wants that particular some one to do forever and anon. Dont you let them believe it. We're aching for a chance for some versatility display. Rafael Saliva, Mayaguez, Porto Rico, sends the following interesting information : If I had been visiting in the States and happened to be in St. Louis during the race riots, would that have been a reason for me to report that in the United States the people live in continual disturbances, that negroes are usually burnt alive, and so on? Surely not. Eugenia Keleher has written an article