Screenland (May-Jul 1926)

90 SCREENLAND Famous Film Folks By C. D. FOX ccTJtOW old is Gloria Swanson?" "What JTlL color hair has Corinne Griffith?" "How tall is Thomas Meighan?" "Who is Percy Marmont's wife, if any?" "Where was Pola Negri born?" "Where did Mae Murray go to school?" These are a few of the countless questions that movie fans constantly asked about film favorites. Charles Donald Fox, noted authority on motion picture subjects, answers these and many other questions about hundreds of famous screen stars in this newest of his popular motion picture books. But its most sensational feature is its gallery of portraits of famous film folk. Illustrated with 242 Photographs PRICE $2.00 TO ANY ADDRESS in U. S., CANADA OR MEXICO SCREENLAND Book Department 236 W. 55th ST. NEW YORK, N. Y. EVERYBODY PLAYS i this JAZZ1T UKULELE FDFCi Instant LessoD and rKbt. Song Book aent b Ukulele. You can play , once with our wonderful instruction book. SEND NO MONET — Pay postman only :*-ivV $'.i.9S plus a few The simp est instrument m ^»VV cents postage when the world to play. No lessons necessary — strum z\\ the latest hits. Great fun — sing — dance and make merry. Become the most popular one m your crowd. Beautiful professional instrument, finely made. Full size: not a toy. SINCERE STUDIOS 24 East 21 St. Dept 172. New York $ $ For Photoplay Ideas Don't send your manuscripts to studios until first protected by copyright. Plots accepted in any form; revised, criticised, copyrighted, .marketed. We are right on the ground in daily touch with the studios. Not a school — no courses or books to sell. Advice free. UNIVERSAL SCENARIO COMPANY 226 Security Bldg., Santa Monica and Western Ave. Hollywood, California You can safely reshape your nose to beautiful proportions with /qniTR nosE awuster — painlessly, comfortably, ^tr**: Results speedy and guaran-02|fe teed. Physicians praise it Els; * highly. No metal to harm fTri . _f you. Winner of GnW Medal. 1023. V-sr \ FBEK HOOKI.KT \S Write for it today. : ANITA CO. Dept. 769 ANITA Building Newark. N. J. BEFORE! AFTER A Film Is As Good As Its Villain — Com. from page 55 Here you have Old England with its pleasant countryside and its frowning baronial halls. The great room of the mansion, with its armor and its tapestries, is a dead ringer for what you'd have to pay two bits to see if you were touring a la Cook and the castle and its grounds look just like those listed under special "points of interest" in the guide books. This little opus may not be advertised on the posters outside the theatres, but I hope you're lucky enough to run into it on some program. Miss Johnston has been seen all too infrequently since she appeared in "The Thief of Bagdad", and it's nice to see her again in such a delightful film. And just while we're in England we might take a short side-trip into Scotland — it'll only cost us two bits more, and we'll have a chance to get a glimpse of the home of a Scottish laird before taking the boat for the land of liberty, chewing gum and baseball. This estate in the Highlands seems as big as the State of Rhode Island and the mansion, from the outside, is a fair imitation of the Metropolitan Museum. Unfortunately, our sightseeing tour is marred by a driving rain, but we can see enough of the place to wonder how a Scotchman ever loosened up enough to build such a costly residence. In this expansive and expensive place lives a young man and his mother. Father isn't mentioned — maybe he died from the shock when he got the bills. Anyhow, the young man, who, gentle reader, is none other than Rod La Rocque, is engaged to an American girl, who is visiting them. He brings home the family jools — and then things begin to happen. Various mysterious persons drop in out of the Scotch mist, including a detective and a body-less furry hand which keeps creeping up over the tops of tables and chairs. The jools disappear and one after another of the characters goes through thrilling adventures, all of which are couched in terms of the most hilarious burlesque. In the end, the furry hand is shown to belong to a detective who follows the best traditions of Sherlock Holmes, both in method and appearance. The jools are restored, the girl's father is reconciled to having her marry the Scotch dude, and all is well. Even the villains are left to find their way out into the rain. This opus, known as "Bachelor's Brides"' (a title which, liks the plot, has nothing to do with the case), is extremely funny. It kids the mystery movie to death and makes you feel kinda sheepish about the shivers you shivved at "The Bat". Eddie Gribbon helps things along by kidding himself — he was the real, though dumb, detective in "The Bat", you may remember, and in "Bachelor's Brides" he acts just the same as he did in the former film, which is our idea of satire made perfect. You're going to enjoy this picture — that is, if you don't get tired of the fooling before the film is finished. At any rate, you get a glimpse of Scotland and you can get on with your tour. Assuming that your pocketbook won't stand the European strain (which isn't a pun), you might be satisfied with a little jaunt down into the picturesque mountains of old Kentucky. If so, you'll find mountains and mountains in a picture called "The Earth Womdn", which Associated Exhibitors are offering to the summer tourists. And right here I want to say a word in favor of villains, though there's no connection between this thought and the word "tourists". As I watched "The Earth 'Woman" unfold, it struck me that we haven't been giving the lowly villain his due. If you stop to think about it, you'll find that no picture is stronger than its villain. If the bad man isn't bad enough to make you tremble for the safety of the fair and innocent heroine, you don't get much of a kick out of the picture. But if he's strong and sufficiently dastardly — oooh! how you do keep your eyes glued on the screen when he's around. With that thought in mind, let's take a look at those Kentucky villain-infested mountains. The earth woman is our old friend Mary Alden, all dressed up in homespun and gingham, a pioneer who follows the plow and helps carve out civilization in the wilderness. She has a son and a daughter— and there, of course, is the rub. The gal is loved by the manly young sheriff — ■ oh, yes, sheriffs aren't found only in the great open spaces — but there's a city slicker who means no good to our Nell. He infatuates her with his fine way, or maybe it's his Hart, Schaffner and Marx clothes; but at any rate she forgets the sheriff and goes to the villain's cabin — to marry him, censorially speaking. He tries to steal a kiss, which so horrifies her that she faints and he is left to wreak his will upon her. But a friend of the family, a nature-loving half-wit, has followed them and he brings word to the earth woman of the situation. She drops her plow and hastens to the cabin and shoots the dirty dog. But her husband hasn't much of a reputation around those parts and the citizens, lacking much chance for amusement, decide that he killed the villain, and start to lynch him. Then comes the woman to confess her crime, which the noble mountaineers don't credit. They proceed with the hanging, but just at the well known psychological moment the nit-wit appears, dying from injuries received in a fall, and says that he, and not the woman, fired the fatal shot. So all is well, the girl is saved for the sheriff, the villain is full of buckshot, and the earth woman is free to return to the waiting plow. On the whole, this is a satisfying picture, particularly if you are at all sentimentally inclined. It is full of pathos, which is often dragged to the point of bathos, and has much of mother love, sacrifice, and just oodles of villainy. The parts showing the home life of the mountaineers were by far the most interesting to this reviewer, having a simple, wholesome tone which was very welcome in these days of Paris dancers and like flora and fauna. From the standpoint of seeing America first, the picture is real money in your pocket. For two bits you can see stretches of Kentucky hills and valleys which, even if they are in California, are beautiful and majestic. Miles on miles of rolling ranges, with deep, soft valleys between, should be a sight to warm the blood of any tourist, and when you're taken into the lowly hut of the mountaineers, you get right to the,' heart of America. And when it comes to villains, you'll make no mistake in "The Earth 'Woman": This desperate character is a cross betweeri a bulldog with rabies and a banker foreclosing the mortgage on the old homestead. He not only shoots the girl's brother in cold blood and horse-whips the half-wit friend of the family, but he tricks the simple maiden so suavely that you can fairly see the scarlet letter trembling on her forehead. And when he gets his'n, how good you feel — a warm glow steals over you at the thought of righteousness triumphing.