| Monday next, January 5th 1970 - A British Edgar Wallace Program: DARK EYES OF LONDON (1939, dir: Walter Summers) with Bela Lugosi, Hugh Williams; and THE SQUEAKER (1937, dir: William K. Howard) with Edmund Lowe, Ann Todd, Robert Newton
Note: this program is being printed some two weeks in advance, and thus we cannot even guess as to whether the regular transportation strike will be upon us again -- and even if it is, it may well be settled by the time the 5th rolls around. However, if there is a subway and bus strike on any Huff night, that program will be automatically cancelled, and rescheduled later.
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December 29th 1969 |
The Theodore Huff Memorial Film Society |
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| THE GIRL IN THE SHOW |
(MGM, 1929) Scenario and direction by Edgar Selwyn |
Based on the play Eva the Fifth by John Kenyon Nicholson and John Golden
Camera, Arthur Reed; 7 reels
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| With Bessie Love, Edward Nugent, Raymond Hackett, Ford Sterling, Jed Prouty, Mary Doran, Nanci Price, Lucy Beaumont, Richard Carlyle, Alice Moe, Frank Nelson, Jack McDonald, Ethel Wales, John F. Morrissey. |
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An obscure film from that transitional year of 1929 when even non-obscure films had a habit of getting lost in the shuffle, The Girl in the Show is a slight but rather charming little picture about a small-town "Uncle Tom's Cabin" troupe. Its appeal is nostalgic, its value less as a motion picture than as a rather realistic reconstruction of rural time and locale. Nothing very much happens in it, yet its simple plot twists are far from predictable, and in any event it's always a delight to watch Bessie Love (still a very charming person and most capable actress) in a lead role. Be prepared to relax and not expect to encounter any dramatic thunderbolts, and I think you'll find The Girl in the Show a most enjoyable if minor movie.
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| TORCH SINGER |
(Paramount, 1933) Directed by Alexander Hall and George Somnes |
Screenplay by Lenore Coffee and Lynn Starling from Mike by Grace Perkins
Camera, Karl Struss; 7 reels
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| With Claudette Colbert, Ricardo Cortez, David Manners, Lyda Roberti, Baby Leroy, Florence Roberts, Shirley Ann Christensen, Cora Sue Collins, Ethel Griffies, Helen Jerome Eddy, Mildred Washington, Charley Grapewin, Virginia Hammond, Albert Conti, Kathleen Burke, Davison Clark, William B. Davidson, Bobby Arnst, Edward Le Saint, James Burke. |
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Torch Singer is a curiosity indeed -- a stark, Warner Brothers-type of sex and confession melodrama, but done with the glossier, ladies' magazine approach of Paramount, and steering clear of the raw but more honest characters that peopled such stories over at Warners. None of it is very credible, and since Miss Colbert rises from unwed mother to luxury and the top income tax bracket very quickly it doesn't even have the superficial realism of the Chatterton, Davis and Stanwyck travails in Burbank. However, it's a surprisingly enjoyable film, held together almost entirely by the tour-de-force performance of Claudette Colbert, who not only runs the emotional gamut, but puts on an altogether remarkable show as a singer. Clearly it is her voice, and she not only sings well, but "sells" her songs well in terms of style, stance, body movements and so on. It's an aspect of the Colbert personality that never seemed very likely, and the surprising thing is that she wasn't immediately thrust into more of the same.
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--- William K. Everson ---
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