Silver Screen (Nov 1938-Apr 1939)

"Angels With Dirty Faces." James Cagney is the hard one and Pat O'Brien the priest. "Men With Wings" revealed the beauties of Technicolor when called upon to show sky and clouds. Fred MacMurrary, Louise Campbell and Ray Milland. BROTHER RAT The Funniest Comedy Of The Year— Warners ADAPTED from the Broadway hit play of the same name, this picture has lost none of the boisterous fun of the original. The action takes place at the Virginia Military Institute (the "West Point of the South") and thanks to swell direction the authentic feeling of college life pervades the film just as it did the play. The story's all about the adventures, loves and headaches of three first classmen, Wayne Morris, Ronald Reagan, and Eddie Albert, during their last few weeks before graduation— and oh boy, it looks for a while there as if they'll never get their diplomas. Things begin to happen when the girls arrive for the big baseball game, and there isn't a dull moment up to the final commencement exercises. Wayne plays one of those incorrigible young cadets who leads his "brother rats" into one mess after another— everything from pawning government property to sneaking out after taps to call on Priscilla Lane. But, judging from the preview audience applause that greeted his every scene, the picture belongs to Mr. Eddie Albert of the New York stage, the only member of the Broadway cast in the picture. As the slow-thinking, bewildered cadet who is secretly married to Jane Bryan, and who discovers on the eve of the big game that he is about to become a father, Eddie gives a splendid performance. Tis said that following the preview every studio in Hollywood offered Mr. Albert a contract, with Warners winning out. Jane Wyman scores as the Colonel's daughter and the scene where she and Priscilla are smuggled into the boys' room to help Eddie pass his chemistry exam is a high spot in the picture. Her "Papa won't like it" will long be remembered. Well, Papa and Grandma and the entire family will like this picture. ing over Nan Grey, the ship's nurse, which isn't cleared up until she has performed a successful appendectomy on Tom during a most terrific storm at sea. Of course the captain of the ship turns out to be the same old meanie (Barton MacLane) who let Charlie's best friend die— and that brings on more fights. Preston Foster is in for a small part, which should be larger, and Andy Devine and Frank Jenks look after the comedy. ARTISTS AND MODELS ABROAD A Gay And Irrepressible Comedy With Music— Par. THAT funny fellow Jack Benny is here again. And this time "Buck" gets a perfectly swell comedy with plenty of gay gags, grand humor, good music, and delirious lines. And if this isn't enough he even gets the girl— the girl being the beautiful Joan Bennett, who is well worth getting. (Joan is the only actress so far who looks well with her hair piled high on her head.) Jack plays Buck Boswell, the fast talking manager of a madcap troupe of Americans who go broke in Paris and are so eager to get back to New York that they are willing to be deported. Jack practically manages to get them deported, but before that everything happens to them from weiner roasts over the gas jets to a gorgeously staged fashion show. Joan is happily cast as the daughter of a millionaire Texas oilman— she's only the fourth richest girl in America— who is in Paris with her Aunt Mary Boland to arrange her marriage to a stuffy young diplomat. She's quite bored by it all, and when Jack meets her under unusual circumstances and believes her to be a girl who's down on her luck she accepts his offer to become a part of the "act." Charley Grapewin is simply grand as the wealthy Texan who gets mixed up in Mr. The famous quints had a gay time making "Five Of A Kind." THE STORM A Sea Story With Plenty Of Action— U. /CHARLIE BICKFORD plays a big twoVJ fisted wireless operator who is pretty well fed up with the sea when his best friend is left to drown on a sinking ship. He tries to make his kid brother (Tom Brown) become a farmer but Tom also turns to marine wireless. Charlie and Tom have a misunderstand Benny's troupe to please his daughter. The Yacht Club Boys give out with a rousing number called "You're Broke, You Dope." The girls are extremely easy on the eyes. THE SISTERS A Best-selling Novel Becomes A Superb Motion Picture— WB BETTE DAVIS and Errol Flynn are teamed most satisfactorily in the screen for January 1939 53