“KNOCK-OUT REILLY”

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 114, 4 August 1927, Page 17

“KNOCK-OUT REILLY”

REGENT TO-MORROW Starred in a fast-moving film of a young steel puddler whose ability with his fists wins him fistic fame and the girl of his dreams,

Richard Dix arrives at the New Regent Theatre to-morrow. “Knockout Reilly” is the name of his latest Paramount screen effort, and it is reputed by those in the know to be the most engrossing Dix offering ever. As Dundee Reilly, Dix works in a steel mill, and on Saturday night goes out in search of a

little recreation and romance. Although professing utter disregard of all girls, he is immensely flattered when he receives a message purporting to be from Mary Malone (Mary Brian), pretty entertainer in a cabaret that he and his friends frequent. The message invites him backstage to meet her, and not knowing that this is a little joke of his friends, he leaves his table and goes fo her dressing room. He finds there Killer Agerra (Jack Renault), champion pugilist, making advances to Mary, and without knowing who he is, knocks him out. Later Agerra reciprocates by decoying Reilly to his gymnasium and beating him up. Reilly, looking for revenge, puts himself in the hands of Pat Malone, Mary’s brother, himself u former pugilist, for training, and rapidly rises to gladiatorial eminence. Complications set in, and Reilly, on the eve of a championship fight with Agretta, finds himself railroaded to prison for two years for felonious as-

sault. How he manages to keep in condition, notwithstanding his confinement, and how, on his release, he clears his name, and wins the girl and the championship, are unfolded in a series of dramatic scenes in which the light humorous touch of director Malcolm St. Clair is always evident. Events move rapidly to a smashing denouement, in which Dix wins out in the end.