Screenland (May-Oct 1930)

for August 2930 87 on Current Films The Light of Western Stars WESTERN, 1930 style. Thoroughly enjoyable, too, with its expensive cast, elaborate mounting, and sane and modern direction. Paramount's brand of wild and wooly melodrama is making fans of the fathers as well as the small boys — in fact, sonny is now obliged to hurry through his home work and take dad to the movies to see Dick Arlen ridin' and roamin' his way through his latest refined 'horse opera.' And no hardship for sonny, either. Arlen represents the New Bill Hart school of western heroes. He doesn't talk to his horse or ride away into the sunset all alone. No — he persuades Mary Brian to go along. Mary is charming as always as the girl with the light of western stars in her eyes. But Harry Green almost runs away with the picture. What Harry's doing out on the western plains is a mystery; but here he is, and very funny, too. You'll have to laugh. Ladies Love Brutes IF you want to be chilled and thrilled, let George do it. Bancroft is indisputable monarch of movie melodrama. His pictures are uncut — the real stuff, with a kick. You can count on rousing, red-blooded entertainment with never a lull. And while George is always the big-hearted brute, he is a different man in each new picture. His latest presents him as a big steel and scaffold man, a skyscraper builder in the big city. He's a two-fisted fighter, a man's man — until he meets the woman. She is a patrician beauty; but they have one common interest — their sons. When both children are kidnapped the thrills come faster. You won't anticipate the outcome of the kidnapping plot, but the title, "Ladies Love Brutes," divulges the secret of the romance between Mary Astor, as the lovely heroine, and Mister Bancroft, the world's most successf,,l t- Miss Astor's come-back is gratifying. Song of the Flame A T last we've seen — and heard — a logical reason for a revo/\ lution. Not musty politics, the edict of a king, the / V chess-playing of a bishop; but stirring music which "*~ excited the people so that they simply had to up and revolt! That's the celluloid low-down on the recent situation in Russia, according to "Song of the Flame," which is a notable picture if only for the fact that George Gershwin and Herbert Stothart composed the music responsible for the upheaval. Bernice Claire, all in Technicolor, looks lovely and sings splendidly as La Flame who started things; while Alexander Gray emerges as a prince with genuine sex appeal and an always satisfying voice. Noah Beery contributes an amazing baritone, booming out one of those drinking songs with great gusto. The music makes this picture one of the real treats among the celluloid operettas. Dramatically it fails to thrill. The Texan REUNITING Gary Cooper and Fay Wray in a western that turns into a South American romance, this filmization of "The Double-Dyed Deceiver," will please the Cooper addicts, win new friends for Fay, and pass a pleasant, if not too exciting evening. The picture has plot aplenty, with all the twists and turns for which O. Henry was famous. Gary plays the colorful role of The Llano Kid, who quits his native state in haste after a shooting fray and masquerades as a missing son so convincingly that he wins a nice little old lady's regard and the rather more sentimental interest of a Latin beauty. You may be surprised to meet Fay Wrray as the senorita; don't be, for Fay is a versatile actress and behaves becomingly in her new role. Gary, too, steps and speaks out, spouting Spanish most acceptably and cutting a dashing figure as a bold hombre. This big boy is becoming a real actor.