NEW REGENT

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 568, 22 January 1929, Page 15

NEW REGENT

“THE CROWD”

The little things of life count more than the big incidents, which stand out with such glaring effect.

Many times motion pictures with great melodramatic highlights fail for the simple reason that, while these incidents are of tremendous importance to some minds, they are of negligible importance to the great majority of picture-goers. When King Vidor produced “The Big Parade” for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer he was advised that public opinion was against war and that there are still thousands of grieving hearts, occasioned by the recent world conflict. Nobody could imagine a war picture as Vidor imagined it.

Yet all these little things exist in time of peace—and go by unnoticed by the general public. Vidor recognises them in time of peace as well as war, and he lias produced "The Crowd” for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in a manner that it may well be called “the big parade of peace.” The entire picture is nothing but the little occurrences in the lives of the millions who composed the great American middle class, who work for a daily living and each day are more and more discouraged. by" the outcome of their efforts.

“The Crowd,” which is now playing at the New Regent Theatre, is one of the finest pictures filmed in the last decade, and marks a step of progress in the picture industry as visual literature. Eleanor Board man and James Murray have the leading roles.

The second feature is “The Girl in the Pullman,” an enjoyable comedy starring Marie Prevost and Harrison Ford. The story revolves around the career of a. successful young doctor, his divorced wife and his latest sweetheart. The scenes are laid for the greater part of the film in a railway carriage, and a series of amusing adventures follow before a thrilling accident brings the picture to a happy ending.

Mr. Arthur G. Frost, the conductor of the Regent Operatic Orchestra, plays on the grand organ a novel composition entitled “Plantation Melodies,” in harmony with a quartet of male voices.

On Thursday next the New Regent will present an entirely nexV programme. This will be headed.by “The Forbidden Woman,” a story of fashionable Paris. and the deserts of Algiers, starring Jetta Goudal. The second picture will be the Zane Grey story, ‘Beyond the Sierras,” starring Tim McCoy.