PICTURE THEATRES

Evening Star, Issue 23701, 8 October 1940, Page 11

PICTURE THEATRES

REGENT Third of the ‘ Ur Kildare ’ series of films. ‘The Secret of Dr Kildare,’ ■which is at the Regent, is as engrossing and well-acted as its predecessors. Lionel Barrymore is the crusty, hardboiled physician who is at heart one of the most sentimental of humans, while Lew Ayres is his assistant. HARDY FAMILY AGAIN. Troubles —both financial and romantic —and Andy Hardy are apparently inseparable, and Mickey Rooney is again “up to his neck in hot water ’’ in ‘ Judge Hardy and Son,’ which will ■commence its Dunedin season on Friday at the Regent, The familiar Hardy characters all appear at their best in this latest of the series, main roles being taken by the veteran Lewis Stone, Fay Holden, Cecilia Parker, Sarah Haden, and Maria Ouspenskaya—the latter well-known character actress of stage and screen giving one .of her most memorable performances. It is unnecessary to say that with Judge Hardy’s youngest in the thick of things there are laughs aplenty. EMPIRE * Wagons Westward,’ at the Umpire, introduces a narrative angle not usually associated with Westerns, which, on the whole, ate much of a muchness as regards story material. The film opens with an Indian attack being repulsed by an isolated pioneer family. During this one of the two small sons shows a definite strain of cruelty, the other, of course, being the antithesis of his brother in temperament. FAIRBANKS AND BENNETT. Teamed together for the first time, Douglas Fairbanks, jun., and Juan Bennett are said to make one of the most striking romantic couples ever seen in a motion picture. They will be seen as co-stars of ‘ Green Hell,’ initial Famous Productions film for Universal release, which will come to the Empire on Friday. In the story Joan is inadvertently marooned in the jungle camp of six men, headed by Fairbanks, who resents her presence because of its demoralising effect upon his men Joan is equally spiteful toward him. The plot requires an attack by savages to bring about this transition. STATE ■ The Stars Look Down,' one of the most important films to come from British studios recently, is at tho State. This is a picture adaptation of A. J. Cronin’s famous novel of the same name, and puts a moving case for the betterment of conditions in some of the coal mining areas in England. The main theme is told in a story concerning David Fenwick, a

young man of mining stock, who gains a scholarship and goes to university, intending to devote his energies ultimately in fighting for better working conditions for the people he has known all his life. NAVAL COMEDY, A comedy-romance, ‘ Sailor's Lady, 1 starring Nancy Kelly, Joan Davies, and Jon Hall, will be the next film at the State. It has a naval background. Said to be one of the wittiest comedies of the year, ‘ Sailor’s Lady ’ tells the story of a sailor’s sweetheart who smuggles her adopted baby aboard a warship. ST. JAMES A new and more sympathetic Edward G. llobinson, giving a brilliant performance in a tense, vivid theme of blazing oil well fires and a prison camp, is seen in ‘ Blackmail,’ at the Sfc. James, in it llobinson, although again in the toils of the law, is not tho gangster, the killer, or the racketeer. Sent to prison nine years before the story opens for a crime he diet not commit, llobinson, as an escaped convict, is returned to a prison camp through tho hypocrisy and treachery of a former shipmate. FORMBY RIOT RETURNS. It is not the lot of every performer to be able to compose his or her own song numbers, but this does not go for George Fonnby, England’s ace film-stago-and-radio comedian, starring in ‘ Como On George.’ the riotous horseracing comedy which will come to the St. James on Friday. Of the C 6 numbers Fonnby has recorded he has written and composed 38 himself. Gene Autry and Smiley Burnette are the stars of the film which will be in support. 1 Colorado Sunset ’is its name. STRAND An outstanding murder mystery, ‘ Double Alibi,’ which bends the current programme at the Strand, provides plenty of action and excitement. The principal roles are taken by Wayne Morn's, who plays a murder suspect, a detective, and a reporter; Margaret Lindsay and William Gargan. while Boscoo Karns and James Burke are in support. The .second production is ‘ Hidden Gold.’ another of the Hopalong Cassidy films. OCTAGON ‘ Everything Happens at Night,’ at the Octagon, is a comedy-romance of two rival newspaper correspondents out after a world-shattering “ scoop/' It is entirely new in plot, thoroughly entertaining in dialogue, and extremely fast-moving in action. Hay Millan'd and Ilobert Cummings are the two newshawks, one typically English, tho other unmistakably American. Both give first-rate characterisations of their parts. Their search is for a Nobel Peace Prize winner whose efforts led him some years before to a German concentration camp, from which

ho escaped, apparently to be shot by enemy agents. HILARIOUS COMEDY. The conflict between a kissless bride and a legally dead wife over the same husband brings about dramatic and hilarious complications in the new Irene Dunne-Cary Grant co-starring film for RKO Radio, ‘My Favourite Wife,’ which will come to the Octagon on Friday. Loo M‘Carey, who guided the two stars in ‘ The Awful Truth,’ is responsible for the new scintillating hit directed by Garson Kanin, of ‘ Bachelor Mother ’ fame. GRAND A highly dramatic theme is exploited with marked effect in ‘ A Woman is the Judge,’ which is to finish to-night at the Grand. This production tolls an enthralling story of a woman judge who is required to try her own daughter for murder. The second picture is ‘ Outlaws of the Prairie,’ in which Charles Starrett is starred. TENSE ALASKAN DRAMA. One of the most ambitious film sets ever built in a London studio was erected for the Crazy Gang’s third and latest screen comedy, 1 Frozen Limits,’ which will be released at the Grand to-morrow. The set represented Red Gulch City, a mining town, ostensibly in Alaska, the place where, tradition has it, “ men are really men.” In a very confined space at the studios a small army of carpenters, with only a blue-print plan to guide them, constructed a set that “ breathed the very spirit ” of the Yukon. All the edifices familiar from American “ Westerns ” wore present with just that vital “ diffrencc.” When Dad retires and heads the Jones Family towards Broadway, things are hound to happen, and happen fast! And they certainly do just that in ‘ Young As You Feci.’ the newest and funniest of the Twentieth Century-Fox comedies, which will be the associate feature. Dad Jed Prouty turns jitterbug and Ma Spring Byington goes ‘‘ glamour girl.” MAYFAIR 1 The Women,’ Clare Boothe’s brilliant and satire on women of a particular class, is to (InisP to-night at the Mayfair. The second picture is ‘ Mvstery of the White Room,' an excellent murder mystery. ‘ SAN FRANCISCO ’ AGAIN. Spencer Tracy, Clark Gable, and Jeannette Macdonald have easily the finest roles of their careers in the epic ‘ San Francisco.’ which will again he screened ut the Mayfair, to-morrow. This remarkable film tolls the .story of the events loading up to the disastrous earthquake, and then, with gripping realism, reproduces that great upheaval. ,