AMUSEMENTS

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 165, 31 March 1939, Page 4

AMUSEMENTS

“VIVACIOUS LADY” With its- delightful theme based on the conflict between oid-lashioned theories and modern actualities in wedlock “Vivacious Lady” cornea to the Do Luxet Theatre on Saturday and Monday with Ginger Rogers and James Stewart co-starred. Miss Rogers depict? a Broadway night .club entertainer, whom, Stewart, a botany professor from a little upstate college, woos and wins in a hectic courtship. When he brings his bride home to the dignified college town and contemplates breaking the news to his stern college president father, he loses courage and remains silent. Out- of this silence grow the many hilarious situations that follow. Stewart’s mother, a hypochondriac, has-“lie-art trouble” whenever an argu- , merit starts' between her husband '** aifd her tall young' son ■ a local girl, who thinks she is engaged to Stewart, begins laying embarrassing plans for their coming marriage, and Stewart’s playboy „ eou.sin, the only one who knows their secret, manages to tangle things up in trying to straighten out the affair! On top of this, Miss Rogers grows impatient with being a wife in name '.‘uly, and with Stewart’s procrastination. These various threads aYtjpwoven into, a hectic plot which o’’ to> a clever climax and' soljgtfe the pro. blem in entertaining fashion. ... ; As the little Broadway singer who, v ' : finds matrimony not all it’s supposed to be, Miss Rogers has one of tie finest roles:of her career, and her per-? formance is brilliantly counterpointed by Stewart’s portrayal of the hesitant husband. James Ellison as worldly-wise cousin, Charles Coburn as the Puritanical lather and Beulah Bondi as the timorous, mother 'lead the supporting cast in noteworthy characterisations. v . ' ' With its uniquely.. contrived plot and its realistic treatment ol tile genuinely human characters it depicts, Vivacious Lady” marks a. real parture in romantic screen witli an underlying serious 'note, beneath its gaiety. The’film’s one song number, “You’ll Re Reminded of Me,’-’ was written by George Jessel, Jack Meskill and ’led Shapiro, and is sung in one of the niglit club scenes by Miss Rogers. “ARSENE LUPIN RETURNS’’. Arsene Lupin, that famous fictional character , created by Maurice Lo Blanc, is revived in “Arsene Lupin Returns,” which screens Saturday.: and Monday at the De Luxe Theatre. . In this new mystery thriller the adventures of the famous gentleman jewel thief, who is supposed to be dead, are continued. Melvyn Douglas,. Virginia Bruce and Warren William share leading roles, with John Halliday and Nat Pendleton' also prominently east. In the supporting cast are Monty W oolley, E. IE. Clive and George Zu'-eo. The picture was directed by George I’itiimaurice. TTie story’s action races at breathless speed from the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Washington and New York, to the haunts of crime in Paris. The story begins with Warren William taking a job with an insurauce company to guard a valuable emerald, owned by Halliday. William falls in love with Halliday’s daughter, Miss Bruce. Meanwhile a paste copy of the jewel is stolen.'The thief leaves a card marked! “Arsene Lupin.” Accompanied by William, .Halliday and bis daughter move to Paris where they meet Douglas, a friend or the family. Several more attempts are made to get the jewel, and in the course of events two suspects are Billed. Pendleton and Clive, two of Douglas’ friends, come to his country place and accuse him of “coining back to lile” as Arsene Lupin. Lupin then enters the case, but not until tho final scene is the real murderer revealed.