Photoplay (Jul - Dec 1939)

Shadow Stage (Continued jrom page 55) THE KID FROM KOKOMO-Warners WARNERS have simply taken the lid off on this one. It's boisterous, burlesqued comedy of the unfettered, never-mind-making-any-sense school. Wayne Morris and Pat O'Brien carry the burden of the piece, with May Robson helping out every chance she gets. Morris plays the country yokel who can fight like a whiz, and who has a simple sentimental yen to find his longlost mother. O'Brien, a fight manager, persuades the kid to become a professional boxer, arguing that only in this way — with the publicity and all — will he ever turn mama out of her hiding. In a crisis, Pat bails drunken May Robson out of jail and tells the kid this is his Ma. Everything gets very complicated, but Joan Blondell assists Pat, her fiance, and Wayne falls in love with Jane Wyman, and Maxie Rosenbloom gets knocked cold. You'll find a lot of laughs in this thing, even if you can't make head or tail out of the plot. THE GORILLA— 20th Century-Fox I HIS is the picture, you will remember, which the Ritz Brothers didn't want to make. They quit and the studio had one heck of a time getting them back. The result of all this is a somewhat funny opus in which light is made of horror and you are caused to laugh at what made you shudder in the former version. Aside from the mild impression that the Ritz bag of tricks is getting a bit worn, there is nothing to remember after the last scene. After all, it all depends on whether or not you are Ritz fans. Bela Lugosi, Anita Louise and others are victims of it all. • THE GIRL FROM MEXICO-RKO-Radio LUPE VELEZ comes roaring back onto celluloid again, after a long absence, and it's a good picture. Furthermore, Lupe's swell in it. Her forte, of course, is wild comedy and the laughs all come about when Donald Woods, a radio agent, is sent down to Mexico to get a program singer. He finds Lupe, signs her, and then his troubles start. Back in New York again the Velez discovers Don's plans are to marry Linda Hayes (screen comer) . But Lupe's decided she wants Don herself — and she sets out to fix things up proper. Don can't escape her because he's promised everybody in the village, including Lupe's parents and the local judge, that he'll look after her. As if she needed anyone to look after her! There's plenty of slapstick in this and of course you have the fiery little Mexican's personality to watch, which would be almost sufficient without the good story, the galloping pace, the able direction. SOME LIKE IT HOT-Paramount Y OU would have thought, with Gene Krupa's drums to work with, and a supporting cast of Bob Hope and Shirley Ross and Una Merkel, that Paramount could have turned out a particularly fine piece of entertainment here. The film is disappointing. There's not much story, but what there is concerns a midway barker (Hope) who, with his company, tries to outrun the proverbial doorstep wolf. There are a couple of good songs thrown in, and Hope tries very hard throughout. Some like it hot, certainly — but this is peas porridge cold. EXILE EXPRESS-United Players-G. N. IN this out-and-out melodrama, in which producer Eugene Frenke brings his wife, Anna Sten, back to the screen, another helping of Americanism is passed around. Stirring our patriotic emotions, this time, is the tale of a girl whose hope of citizenship is dashed just as she is about to swear allegiance to our country. Implication in the murder of her chemist boss, who has completed a deadly acid, makes her an undesirable alien and she is shipped across country on the Exile Express for deportation. The spies responsible for the chemist's death, attempt to kidnap her for she, alone, knows the secret of the acid's formula. This leads to a crazyquilt series of events climaxing in a fade-out of Anna, starry-eyed, taking her citizenship oath, flanked by hero reporter, Alan Marshal. He, by the way, is the guy who unmasks master spy, Jerome Cowan, establishes Anna Sten's innocence and wins the fair lady. BOY FRIEND— 20th Century-Fox IlUSKY little Jane Withers is still chasing down the gangsters and helping out the police in this latest of her pictures. Her brother is a rookie cop, has been assigned as an undercover man, and Jane snoops, too, for the benefit of eventual justice. Arleen Whelan, once Twentieth Century's white hope, is lost somewhere in this run-of-the-mill piece; her minor romantic interest is played by Richard Bond. 6000 ENEMIES-M-G-M w ALTER PIDGEON, suave and with that sophisticated tired look around his eyes, here plays a prosecutor who is very ambitious politically and convicts all sorts of people on evidence that often is faked. Finally he is railroaded to the pen himself, and whom should he find there but all his 6000 enemies. Of course, he takes a beating. The fault in the story is that you, the audience, can't seem to care. Rita Johnson is in the jailhouse too, and she shows Walter where he made his mistake in life. Nat Pendleton garners a few laughs. FOR LOVE OR MONEY— Universal I HIS is the sort of routine program picture the big producers insist will soon be in limbo. The material is not really susceptible to criticism; one can only relate that a horse-race bet gets into the wrong hands, those of a servant girl, who rushes around spending the money. Robert Kent plays a bookie who doesn't seem to know what it's all about. There are a few wisecracks. FIXER DUGAN-RKO-Radio MELODRAMA in a circus is always fairly acceptable stuff, because you can expect to see some lions and a tightrope artist or two anyway, even if there isn't much story. Lee Tracy plays Dugan, and Peggy Shannon is a lion tamer. Along comes Virginia Weidler, orphaned when her mother falls from a tightrope. Tracy's job is to keep La Shannon's lions from being attached and to keep Virginia out of an orphanage. He does. 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