National Board of Review Magazine (Jan 1939 - Jan 1942)

12 National Board of Review Magazine vocal. Every move of his as the dictator is absurd enough to be funny, and sharp enough to be a cutting exposure of some trait in the Fuehrer's mania, but the bitterest venom of his characterization comes out in the indescribable jargon, utterly untranslatable yet completely understandable, which is the utterance of Hynkel in his greatest furies, and which is certainly one of the most remarkable things that the talkies — or anything else — has ever presented in the form of speech. The world-shadowing figure of Hitler — did you think it couldn't be brought down to the dimensions of a movie screen, pinned there to be laughed at, without lessening its horror ? It can't be laughed away ? A madman is no subject for farce? Take a look at Chaplin's Hynkel — and after you've adjusted it to what you expected, or hoped for, take another look. You're likely to find that Chaplin's genius, working subtly and artfully, has burned up to its greatest creation in this — not caricature — portrait. That it can be laughed at is perhaps useful : it puts this titanic demon into some proportion with other men, a creature that somehow, some time, can be swept aside. The bit of plot in the picture landed Chaplin, the author, in a situation that just couldn't be resolved. When the little persecuted barber had to appear in the dictator's place before the world, what was there for him to do ? Anything but a bombshell would fall flat. The only bombshell was for the picture to gather itself together — all its meaning and purpose — and speak straight out in the voice of Chaplin as the man who made it all. It may not seem in the character of the barber — it is emphatically in the character of the whole picture. What seems to so many an artistic aberration, and perhaps not the most eloquent oration ever uttered, is ma3'be the most useful thing about the film : and certainl)' Chaplin made this film not merely to amuse, but to stir. In that speech Chariot — Charley the little man — really found his voice, and millions of people will know the meaning of it. It is easy to find technical shortcomings in The Great Dictator, in which it doesn't line up with the stream-lined slickness of continuity, photographv, sets, lesser characters, that have become a commonplace in our studios. As a job of picture-making Chaplin has been content to do things just about as he has always done them. He has been himself, but with a further reach. And his grasp has equalled his reach. What other man in motion pictures has put so much time, so much money, so many gifts, into the sincerest expression he could achieve of what he feels about the most important thing in the world today? That will be remembered long after all the other pictures of this year have been forgotten. J.S.H. {Rated Exceptional) The Long Voyage Home Adapted by Dudley Xicliols from four short plays by Eugene O'Neill, directed by John Ford, photographed by Gregg Toland, musical score by Richard Hageman. Produced by Argosy Corporation, presented by Walter Wanger, distributed by United Artists. The Cast Ole Olson ..John Wayne Driscoll .....Thomas Mitchell Smitfy Ian Hunter Yank , _ _ _ IVard Bond Cocky Barry Fitzgerald Donkey Man _ Arthur Shields Axel John Oualcn Davis — _ _ .....Joseph Saz^ycr Captain _ JJ'ilfred Lazvson First Mate Cyril McLaglcn Second Mate Douglas Walton Limchouse Crimp I. M. Kerrigan Freda _ _ Mildred Xatzvick Joe _ Billy Bcvan Scotty _ David Hughes Tropical Woman _ _ Rafaela Ottiano Bumboat Girl ..Carmen Morales Bumboat Girl Carmen D'.-lntonio BACK in the days when Eugene O'Xeill had a middle initial and was writing little one-act plays instead of week-long chronicles, he did four short sea pieces about a British tramp steamer, the Glencairn, not particularly connected except in having the same characters in them all, the men of the ship's crew. In "The ]Moon of the Caribees" the ship was at anchor in a West Indian harbor on a moonlight night, some native women were allowed aboard to sell fruit and they brought rum hidden in their baskets— there was drinking and dancing and fighting till the women were thrown off the boat by the ship's officers, and a man named Smittv had emerged as someone different