Motography (Jan-Jun 1918)

April 20. 1918. MOTOGRAPHY 7S7 Crowds Storm Lyric to See "Over the Top" New York Theatre Swamped First Week of Premiere for New War Picture — Empey Cheered When He Appears ENORMOUS crowds and unbounded enthusiasm that have marked the first week in the Lyric theatre. Xew York, of "Over the Top." Vitagraph's super-production and screen adaptation of Sergeant Arthur Guy Empey's world famous war book of the same name, are believed to assure a long and successful run. Patriotism surcharged the atmosphere in the playhouse the opening night and gripped the throng on the sidewalk, unable to gain admittance, but who were satisfied to spend their enthusiasm in cheering the doughty little American hero as he entered the theatre to address the spectators. So widely has "Over the Top" been read and exploited that Vitagraph had a mighty task in the production of the picture to give to the public all that was expected. If any testimony of the success of the undertaking were needed, in addition to the capacity business, it is found in the trade and daily press reviews, which have been unanimous in their praise. "Even the most enthusiastic readers of Empey's book could not have anticipated the screen possibilities as unfolded in this Vitagraph version." says one reviewer. "Over the Top" was produced to awaken the American people to a keener realization of just what their son> are up against "over there." and is built on actual conditions as they exist and as Sergeant Empey himself found them in his eighteen months of fighting in the front line trenches in France, and as he pictured them in his book. Produced under the personal supervision of Albert E. Smith, president of Vitagraph, the picture not only has accomplished this mission most faithfully, but stands, in the unanimous opinion of newspaper and trade critics, as an ortistic masterpiece. Swift moving and realistic in the extreme, but never grewsome, and with fine regard for the truth, trench scenes, the rush of "our boys" over the top and out into Xo Man's Land, swept by bullets and lurid in the glare of . exploding shells, the hand to hand fighting with the Germans — all these hold the spectators spellbound. These scenes were filmed at Camp Wheeler near Macon, Ga.. by special permission of the war department and have received the official O. K. from Washington. Wilfred Xorth, who directed the picture, had the active assistance of Sergeant Empey in the making of the trench scenes and more than 7.500 American soldiers took part in the several battle scenes, their commanding officers acknowledging actual benefits jB^M^jit ikJ^H mr^n • ; '■' " V . ,:JuH1 ^ WUBEZiifimA Kacssri from their experience before the camera. Xot less effective, perhaps, than these fighting scenes, is the expose of German intrigue spelling death in most cowardly form, striking under the guise of Red Cross workers, undermining the industrial structure of the nation and seeking to obstruct even the government machinery. Xot going beyond the realm of facts, agents of the Kaiser, women as well as men, are shown putting powdered glass into Red Cross bandages, placing deadly poisons into canned provisions intended for our soldiers, blasting and burning munition plants and obtaining by blackmail advance information of troop movements across the Atlantic. Relief from these realities is afforded in a charming romance, with Sergeant Empey, of course, the hero, and with principal roles taken by such widely known Vitagraph screen favorites as Lois Meredith, James Morrison, Betty Blythe, "Mother" Mary Maurice and Arthur Donaldson. Clara Kimball Young and her leading man, Milton Sills, in "The Reason Why," her latest picture for Select. Rivalry Over Snow Scenes \\ hat is the most wonderful snow scene ever filmed? Three of the Vitagraph western companies claim to have it. One is the Hedda Xova Company, working in the serial, "The Woman In the Web." The players, with Director Paul Hurst, journeyed to the Santa Cruz islands to film "sunny summer weather." demanded in the script. But they bumped into a full fledged snow flurry and stoutly maintain that the scenes made of snow clinging to the blossoming trees and plants are the most beautiful ever recorded. William Duncan and his company, having dug themselves out of snow drifts forty feet high in the Big Bear Valley, where they are living for two months in specially constructed log cabins and making exteriors for a forthcoming serial, telephone they have the greatest pictures in the way of "snow stuff" ever taken. And then there is the third, the Xell Shipman Company, lost a fortnight in the mountain passes beyond Truckes, whither the\r journeyed to take rugged scenes for the Blue Ribbon feature, "Bares, Son of Kazan." Over frostbitten wires, Director David Smith telephones that all is well and that despite blizzards beyond imagination, raging night and day, the players have fared forth on snow shoes and that snow scenes, "incomparable and beyond comparison with any ever filmed," have been taken.