Photoplay (Jan - Jun 1932)

Have to Complain About the Bad Ones The Best Pictures of the Month ONE HOUR WITH YOU LADY WITH A PAST THE LOST SQUADRON TARZAN, THE APE MAN SHANGHAI EXPRESS THE PASSIONATE PLUMBER DISORDERLY CONDUCT ALIAS THE DOCTOR THE IMPATIENT MAIDEN The Best Performances of the Month Maurice Chevalier in "One Hour With You" Jeanette MacDonald in "One Hour With You" Genevieve Tobin in "One Hour With You" Ben Lyon in "Lady With a Past" Richard Dix in "The Lost Squadron" Buster Keaton in "The Passionate Plumber" Jimmy Durante in "The Passionate Plumber" Irene Purcell in "The Passionate Plumber" Spencer Tracy in "Disorderly Conduct" Richard Barthelmess in "Alias the Doctor" Fredric March in "Strangers in Love" Casts of all photoplays reviewed will be found on page 135 LADY WITH A PAST—RKO-Pathe A SPARKLING, frothy, gay, young picture that skips along at a happy pace and has a grand time on the way. This story presents no heavy "drammer" or complicated sex problems, but is a cozy, understandable little yarn. Constance Bennett, as a wealthy society miss with no small talk and hence no beaus, finds herself alone in Paris, all dressed up and no place to go. A chance meeting with a penniless young American, who takes on the job of a glorified gigolo turns the trick and our little wallflower blossoms forth a night-blooming orchid. My, oh my, what an orchid! Even in all her gorgeous finery there's something warm and intimate about Connie in this one. Ben Lyon, as the happy-go-lucky and irresponsible American youth stranded in Paris, just about picks up the whole picture and marches blithely off. And where, one wonders, has this Ben Lyon been all our lives? David Manners as Connie's beau seems a bit subdued and even mild after the brightness of Ben and Connie. The dialogue is easy, natural, and spills all over with laughs. There is an air of spontaneity about the whole thing that simply sweeps it into first place. * SHANGHAI EXPRESS— Paramount WHAT a ride! Through the skill of Director Yon Sternberg and realistic camera work, you hop aboard the Shangliai Express and crawl through a revolution. Your fellow passengers are Shanghai Lily (Marlene Dietrich); an English officer (Clive Brook); a Chinese girl (Anna MaxWong) ; a suave Eurasian (Warner Oland) ; a prim matron, a gambler, a querulous invalid, a clergyman. The stage is set for drama, and the story mounts vividly as the camera moves from compartment to compartment and the train roars along. Miss Dietrich was never more beautiful, but her face seems immobile and the constant raising and lowering of her eyelids hardly compensates. Amusing is the perfect English of Anna May Wong in contrast to Dietrich's foreign accent. A fascinating picture. * THE PASSIONATE PLUMBER— M-G-M WHAT do we care how long Chaplin stays in London when we can get comedies like this? Here is an unusual picture that provides a love story, combined with hilarious Mickey Mouse antics. Couldn't be crazier, but it's as funny as it's crazy. The scenes where Buster Keaton serves Irene Purcell breakfast in bed and those in which he goes off to fight a duel rival anything Chaplin ever did for sheer tomfoolery. And that Jimmy Durante deserves the thanks of Congress for making us forget the depression when all the wise men of Washington can't make us forget it. The picture producers should give us more of that clever Purcell girl. Gilbert Roland does well by a minor role. 51