"WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN?"

Taranaki Daily News, 30 August 1917, Page 5

"WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN?"

[ A FILM WITH A 'PURPOSE. ■Race or national suicide is a them* which hne engrossed the attention ol many eminent sociologists, but in most eases it has been dealt witlu in relation to the national existence and progress of a people, the building up of a country's strength and vigor, the propagation of largo and prosperous communities, and the advantages that must follow increased populations of physical and mental strength. In the film produced at Eu-ry. body's Theatre last night the same subject is dealt with in a different way, ' namely, as it affects private home life and true domestic happiness. It with a woman who, so that her soci ' pleasures may not be interrupted, adoptn means to avSid the responsibilities ol motherhood, and so perverts nature that / eventually, wh'en her heart and soul most ardently desire this motherhood, it is for ever beyond her grasp. The husband . is an American district attorney, passionately fond of children, -and sorely grieved because there are no little ones ol liis own to brighten the cheerless monotony of everyday life. With a (treat ' love for his wife, and implicit, faith in her in every way, he deeply and sincerely sympathises with her in the sorrow which he fondly believes she shares with bim. It becomes his duty as an officer of the law to prosecute a villainous med- - ieal practitioner for malpractice resulting in the death, of a young girl, and from ' the books of the miscreant which coma under his professional charge, he learns of the appalling and horrible, truth .that among the patrons wa§" his own wife. Armed witli his documentary evidence, ho hurries to his home to find her surrounded by a number of ladies similarly circumstanced, and after ordering them from the house, confronts her with the proof of, her.shamefn'l guilt. Thereafter the ever present question is "Where aye my children?" and as the years,go |y its reproach becomes more and more bitter and terrible to the erring woman. OH uga brings'no lessening of her poignant regret,'' •'ami'-the 1 last scene is a deeply pathetic one of the venerable couple seated at their hearth, while visions of the happiness that might have been servo but to intensify their loneliness tind misery. It is a. powerful lesson jn dramatic form, a practical sermon gn the highest and noblest ideals of womsih. hood, and a terrible indictment of a practice which, it is feared, is far too prevalent. The film is not "meat fot babes," but it conveys a message te adults which, in the interests of ouj social lifei insistently demands recognition. There arc some details in the picture almost repellant, hut they are necessary to emphasise the evils they mercilessly disclose, and to point in no uncertain way the moral intended to be enforced. The film will be presented again this evening, r.nd thorp should be nnotliei large attendance. The supporting films ( are of a bright and interesting nature, well calculated to relieve the sorabrt but salutory lesson *of the main attraction, j*