Motion Picture Reviews (1943)

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MOTION PICTURE REVIEWS Se7en Yorker atmosphere for this quite delightful little comedy of a worldly widower whose two primly educated adolescent daughters are suddenly thrust upon his hands. Two women vie for his favor, using their respective sons to influence the elder daughter, Victoria, who responds to modern ideas with alacrity. Gloria Jean’s fresh young personality and charming voice and Donald O'Connor’s lively and original behavior, combined with the easy, assured acting of the adult members of the cast, make the play entertaining for many audiences. Adolescents, 12 to 16 Children, 8 to 12 Yes Of doubtful interest ♦ KEEPER OF THE FLAME O O Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Richard Whorf, Margaret Wycherly, Forrest Tucker, Frank Craven, Horace McNally, Percy Kilbride, Aubrey Christie, Darryl Hickman, Donald Meek, Howard da Silva, William Newell. Screen play by Donald Ogden Stewart based on the novel by I. A. R. Wylie. Direction by George Cukor. Produced by Victor Saville. M.G.M. The American public is prone to idealize men and women of spectacular accomplishment and to endow them with its own inherent idealism. “Keeper of The Flame” is intended to discredit blind hero worship and offers a plea for unemotional reasoning. The central character is dead before the story opens, and we know him through the impression made on others. His death brings hysterical grief to a public who idolized him as a World War I hero, a philanthropist, a dynamic speaker and a prolific writer. Gradually we see him through the eyes of those who lived with him, his mother, employees and wife, and the image of the “great man” crumbles before the truth, uncovering facts which prove the fallacy of blind acceptance of any leadership. The film is serious and suspenseful, subjective in treatment. It is an interesting production which might have had real significance had it not fallen far short of perfection in treatment. Adolescents, 12 to 16 Children, 8 to 12 Interest depends No interest upon maturity ❖ MARGIN FOR ERROR <> O Joan Bennett, Milton Berle, Otto Preminger, Carl Esmond, Howard Freenman, Poldy Dur, Clyde Fillmore, Ferike Boros, Joe Kirk, Hans Von Twardowski, Ted North, Elmer Jack Semple, Hans Schumm, Ed McNamara, Selmer Jackson. Screen play by Lillie Hayward from the stage play by Clare Booth. Direction by Otto Preminger. Produced by Ralph Dietrich. Twentieth Century-Fox. Clare Booth’s play had the advantage of appearing on the stage when its settings and characters were of topical interest. Now the time seems almost prehistoric when American police guarded German Consulates, and Bund leaders were allowed to orate at will. The story, however, is pretty good melodrama lightened by the amusing comedy of Milton Berle who, as a Jewish policeman, has the distasteful job of guarding “German soil.” He finds this “soil” very dirty, too, and rejoices when the evildoers get their just desserts. Otto Preminger is good as the Consul, but Howard Freeman is given the assignment of making the Bund leader a comic figure, the movie version of those dangerous conspirators. Adolescents, 12 to 16 Children, 8 to 12 Unobjectionable If interested 4* THE MEANEST MAN IN THE WORLD O Jack Benny, Priscilla Lane, Rochester, Edmund Guenn, Matt Briggs, Anne Revere, Margaret Seddon, Helene Reynolds, Paul Burns, Lyle Talbot. Screen play by George Seaton and Allan House. Based on the play "The Meanest Man in The World," as produced by George M. Cohan. Direction by Sidney Lanfield. Produced by William Perlberg. Twentieth Century-Fox. Jack Benny as Poor Richard, a povertystricken New York lawyer, reduced to eating peanuts cast to hungry pigeons and taking a lollipop from a child, is publicized by a roving reporter; whereupon he is engaged by a rascally millionaire to do his “dirty work” for him. This is an amusing start to an unpretentious farce, done on a lesser scale than most of Benny’s pictures but nevertheless affording some good laughs. Rochester, as usual, is an excellent foil for the leading man. The picture is light entertainment suitable for a double bill. Adolescents, 12 to 16 Children, 8 to 12 Unobjectionable but No interest possibly disappointing ❖ QUIET PLEASE, MURDER O O George Sanders, Gail Patrick, Richard Denning, Lynne Roberts, Sidney Blackmer, Margaret Brayton, Arthur Space. Direction by John Larkin. 20th Century-Fox. Murder and mystery lurk among the stacks in a public library, where the nefarious Fleg forges copies of rare books and manuscripts, selling them for exorbitant prices; his customers even include several Nazi agents. Good characterizations and a welldeveloped plot make this a satisfactory melodrama of ts kind. Adolescents, 12 to 16 Children, 8 to 12 Interesting mystery Too somber ♦ SHADOW OF A DOUBT O O Teresa Wright, Joseph Cotten, Macdonald Carey, Henry Travers, Patricia Collinge, Hume Cronyn, Wallace Ford, Edna May Wonacott, Charles Bates, Irving Bacon, Clarence Muse, Janet Shaw, Estelle Jewell. Screen play by Thornton Wilder, Sally Benson and Alma Reville from an original