REGENT THEATRE

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 49, 20 November 1937, Page 12

REGENT THEATRE

"THE ROAD BAOK."

"The Eoad Back," Erich Mari« j.vomarque's sequel to the f amous story, "All yuiet on the Western Front," will be shown at the Begent Theatre ■to-night, "All Quiet on the Western Front" was a story of the light in the trenches, but "The Eoad Back" tells in an equally dramatic and vivid x'asbion the story of the fight that the chree horoes had to make on their recurn to a civilian world, In prqparing the novel for the screen, B. C. Sherifc, author of "Journey's End," collaborated with Bemarque, and the result is a iilin which retains all the powor oi' the story, with its effectiveness heightened by brilliant photography and dircction. So vividly did the author depict the grimness of post-war Germany that he was exiled, but the purpose of his book was not merely to expose the conditions of his own land but to show from his personal knowledge the effeet that war has on humanity. Albert, the shy, likeable youth who had. gone to the war, returns to lind that a war profiteer has been paying attentions to his fiancee. He shoots the man, with less compunction than he had shot his enemies in the war, and cannot understand why he is tried for murder when he had reason for his deed. Other ' episodes in the story are presented in an equally poignant fashion. The leading roles in the picture are taken by John King, Richard Cromwell, Blim Summerville and Andy Devine,, while Barbara Bead has the chief feminine part.