Photoplay (Jul-Dec 1935)

• STEAMBOAT ROUND THE BEND— Fox. — Beloved Will Roger? in a dramatic, laughladen love story of a travelling medicine show doctor who disentangles his nephew from serious legal complications. Anne Shirley gives a splendid performance. John McGuire. (Oct.) STOLEN HARMONY — Paramount. — George Raft and Ben Bernie (with the boys) pool their talents happily to make this a thoroughly enjoyable film. Breezy dialogue, catchy songs, snappy dances. Watch for newcomer Lloyd Nolan. Grace Bradley, Goodee Montgomery Charles Arnt. (June) STRANDED— Warners.— You're partly bored, partly amused, by the struggle which ensues when social service worker Kay Francis refuses to marry he-man engineer George Brent because he is antagonistic to her work and its ideals. Direction good, but story is unconvincing. (Sept.) STRANGERS ALL— RKO-Radio.— A pip of a simple little family picture. May Robson is the mother who has four children, all as different as the seasons. Preston Foster, James Bush, William Bakewell, Florine McKinney. Bakewell's performance is aces high. (June) STREAMLINE EXPRESS— Mascot.— Dramatic incidents that occur on a cross-country record run of a streamline train constitute the basis for this story. A fair picture, with Victor Jory, Evelyn Venable. (Nov.) STRUGGLE FOR LIFE, THE— Foy Prod.— A spotty film with a cast of native African tribesmen acting out their struggle for existence. Some good photography. (.Sept.) SWELL-HEAD— Columbia.— Okay lor baseball fans. But aside from the diamond stuff, .this is pretty hackneyed. Wallace Ford, Barbara Kent, and old-timers Sammy Cohen, the late Mike Donlin and Bryant Washburn (July) $10 RAISE — Fox. — The saga of the routine clerk who can't get married without a ten dollar raise is a delightful story in the capable hands of Edward Everett Horton. Karen Morley is his romance; Alan Dinehart the villain. (June) *39 STEPS, THE— GB. — Exciting entertainment when Robert Donat, falsely accused of murder, must uncover a treacherous spy ring in order to save himself and, by coincidence, Madeleine Carroll is forced to accompany him on the perilous adventure. Grand acting, good comedy, suspense. You'll like it. (Sept.) THIS IS THE LIFE— 20th Century-Fox.— Little Jane Withers, a stage prodigy, is mistreated cruelly by the couple who are capitalizing on her talents, forcing her to run away with a young man falsely accused of theft. Fairly cute. (Nov.) • TOP HAT— RKO-Radio.— A sparkling and entertaining film done in the typical Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers tradition and what a grand and glorious tradition that is! Enchanting music and clever dance routines, together with chuckling comedy sequences, make this one picture you should not overlook. Helen Broderick, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore among those present. (Nov.) TRAVELING SALESLADY— First National.— A light, airy little comedy at which you can just relax and look and laugh. Joan Blondell, Glenda Farrell, Hugh Herbert, William Gargan and Ruth Donnelly. (June) TUMBLING TUMBLEWEEDS — Republic. — Gene Autry deserts the radio and comes to the screen together with his well known cowboy ditties, which help divert the attention from a too-complicated plot. So-so. (Nov.) TWO FOR TONIGHT — Paramount. — Bing Crosby clowns and sings his way through this one, disappointing his romanee-in-the-mnonlight fans, and not measuring up very favorably with his past films. Joan Bennett, Thelma Todd are the girls. (Nov.) UNDER THE PAMPAS MOON— Fox.— A last romantic comedy with Warner Baxter in Gaucho garb searching for a stolen race horse and finding lovely Ketti Gallian instead. Jack LaRue, John Miljan, Rita Cansino. Armida. (Aug.) UNWELCOME STRANGER, THE— Columbia. — Little Jackie Searl is the crippled child around a race-track on whom Jack Holt blames a streak of bad racing luck. Just so-so entertainment, but Jackie, Holt, and Mona Barrie are good. (July) • VAGABOND LADY— Hal Roach-M-G-M — A spirited, delightfuly mad, and most enjoyable comedy with Robert Young really coming into his own as the captivating scape-grace son of a too. too dignified family. Evelyn Venable is the romantic prize. Good performances, too, by Reginald Denny. Frank Craven. (June) VILLAGE TALE— RKO-Radio.— A somewhat sordid drama of rural hates, jealousies and thwarted loves, with Randolph Scott, Robert Barrat. Kay Johnson, and a good supporting cast. (July) WELCOME HOME— Fox.— Jimmy Dunn is the romantic grafter who feels the call of home, and protects the old home town from the hoaxes of his giltedged partners. Arline Judge is romantic prize. Whimsical, sentimental and rather meager entertainment. (Sept.) WE'RE IN THE MONEY — Warners. — Joan Blondell and Glenda Farrell as sexy, blonde process servers who mix Cupid and court summonses and with the aid of Hugh Herbert provoke much hearty laughter. Ross Alexander. (Oct.) WEREWOLF OF LONDON. THE— Universal. — If you like blood-curdling excitement, chills and creeps, you'll enjoy shivering to this shocker with Henry Hull as the werewolf who becomes bestial when the moon is full. Warner Oland, Valerie Hobson, Spring Byington. Leave the children at home. (July) WESTWARD HO!— Republic— A thrilling redblooded Western concerning a group of pioneers (the Vigilantes) who aim to rid the West of its notorioubadmen. John Wayne, Sheila Mannors. (Oct.) WHILE THE PATIENT SLEPT— First National — Just another murder mystery, thin in spots. Aline MacMahon and Guy Kibbee are in top form; All n Jenkins, Robert Barrat, Lyle Talbot and Patricia Ellis hold up support But the story sags. (June'* WITHOUT REGRET — Paramount. — Kent Taylor and Elissa Landi make a pleasant bit of entertainment of this semi-murder mystery of a young man who has but a short time to live and settles up a nasty bit of blackmailing in that time. (Nov.) • WOMAN WANTED — M-G-M. — A swell melodrama packed with action, thrills and mystery and which affords Maureen O'Sullivan and Joel McCrea an opportunity to display their comedy talents as well as some good emotional dramatics. Lewis Stone, Robert Greig. (Oct.) We Cover ihe Studios [ CONTINUED FROM PAGE 31 The lights go on and Muni rolls slowly into the scene. The movie doctors press about him, their attitude reverent, attendant. Muni reaches slowly for the phials on the table. "This," he says, giving a doctor some syrup, "is for patient number one. This for number three. Try this on that new case." Muni's voice is faded but warm, detached and deeply touching. This is the twilight of the great career of Pasteur. It is also the kind of scene only Muni could play with such sincerity. When the scene is over, you go out into the bright sunlight, surprised to find yourself in Burbank, California. UP and over the hill takes you not to the poor house, but to Paramount studio. Here Claudette Colbert, the wisest actress in Hollywood, is shooting "The Bride Comes Home." Wesley Ruggles is directing the film and that's a guarantee of entertainment. If advance signs mean anything, this should be one of the most pleasant pictures of the year. In this case, they do mean a lot for Claudette, Wesley and author Claude Binyon form one of the town's best actress-director-writer teams. Their last joint product was "The Gilded Lily." Wes Ruggles is also producing the film himself. But it's really a more or less cooperative job, with everyone pitching in with all he has and having a lot of fun doing it. It's the smoothness and the efficiency of the group that you notice most of all. Not even the gags that are continually passing — such as having grotesque faces painted all over the set to try and break up Claudette in her love scene, and Bob Young claiming he is an M-G-M spy every time he misses a cue — let you forget that here is a bunch who knows its business and knows it well. Claudette wears a simple little black and white dress. She's supposed to be in love with Fred MacMurray and Bob Young, his rival, is telling her what a heel MacMurray is. MacMurray sits off stage, studying his lines. Between scenes he tells Claudette what a heller Young is. "The Bride Comes Home" is set in Chicago. Near that city is a town called Crown Point. You may have heard of it. Crown Point is the place where all Chicagoans elope. The village is plastered with signs like " GET MARRIED HERE," "TWO DOLLARS FOR QUICK MARRIAGE," "SEE THE MARRYING PARSON FOR YOUR WEDDING." Now the thing that worries Wesley Ruggles is this. Will people believe this if he puts it in his picture? Or will the scene become more real with a little less realism? He doesn't know. We left Wes to his worries and dashed over to the "Anything Goes" set, where Bing Crosby and Ethel Merman sing "You're The Top" to Paramount's greatest all-star cast. The all-star cast was on the sidelines. For the whole studio had jammed itself behind the camera for this number. The set is a smartly reconstructed deck of a modern ocean liner. Bing and Ethel give the bright Cole Porter song all the dash and verve of their rhythmic voices. You feel as if the whole sound stage were swaying with them. In the story, Ethel loves Bing but Bing loves some other gal, but this doesn't have any detri mental effect on their vocalizing. Wait till you hear them! And the lyrics are all new, too. Later, Wes's brother, Charlie Ruggles, does a scene with a dog. Charlie Ruggles is supposed to be Public Enemy No. 13 and no matter how bad he tries to be he can't improve his rating. He was disguised in a minister's black frocking when we watched him. Mr. Ruggles seemed quite holy until you looked at his face. Holiness made us think of Marlene Dietrich, so we went to the " Desire" set to watch her emote in her first venture without the arty guidance of von Sternberg. Frank Borzage is directing this one. We saw Marlene, but we didn't see any costumed, slow talking woman of dark mystery The woman we saw was as modern as Myrna Loy and as vivacious as Ginger Rogers. Some visitors approached her for an autographed photo. When she gave them the pictures and smiled good-bye, they said, "Thanks, Miss Dietrich." So it must have been she. Next month the electricians will be calling her Toots. IN "Desire," Dietrich wears her smartest clothes. They are modern, but not extreme, the sort of thing that well dressed women all over the world could wear. Travis Banton, Paramount's stylist, explained Hollywood's sudden style importance by saying the stars are wearing the same sort of clothes on the set that they wear off. With improved photography and an improved general taste, an actress, Travis declares, no longer has to knock your eye out to get across the fact that she is wealthy and worldly. 92