“THE PATENT LEATHER KID”
BARTHELMESS’S LATEST Richard Barthelmess's latest characterisation in “The Patent Leather ICid“ is really a brilliant piece of screen artistry. Barthelmess seems to live the l-ole right throughout the finely dramatic sequences of what has been termed one of the few really “Great” pictures of this decade. The braggart, insolent, overbearing Last Side pugilist, nicknamed “The Patent Leather Kid” because of his Beau Brummel attributes, is presented with a colourful vividness that is amazingly compelling, and provokes admiration for the sheer power of it. As “The Golden Dancer” Molly O’Day is also responsible for an outstanding characterisation. The shadowy background of war provides some thrilling highlights, which never, however, overshadow the vital human Interest of the story, which moves with such convincing smoothness through a gamut of emotional incident. The plot, taken from Rupert Hughes’s fine story, evolves around the regeneration of a coward and the evolution of the blase young fighter who preferred gloves and “framed bouts” to bayonets and warfare. How a woman’s courage helps him attain the ideal of manhood for which she sighs, and incidentally finds her own soul, is the nucleus of an absorbing photoplay.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/SUNAK19280313.2.186.4
Bibliographic details
Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 302, 13 March 1928, Page 16
Word Count
193“THE PATENT LEATHER KID” Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 302, 13 March 1928, Page 16
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