SKYLARK

New Zealand Listener, Volume 6, Issue 141, 6 March 1942, Page 15

SKYLARK

(Paramount)

HE love of a Hollywood husband for his Hollywood wife is a rather terrifying thing. ' It reminds us somewhat of a reliable brand of incendiary

bomb, You light it. It flares up sud-} denly (Love at First Sight, We were Made for Each Other), then, after marriage, it burns quietly for a time, so quietly that you think it’s probably gone out. Then you think perhaps you don’t want your incendiary bomb after all, so you pour sand over it. But it goes on burning fiercely underneath the sand, though you can’t see it burning. And by this time you’ve made up your mind that incendiary bombs are bad things anyway, so you pour cold water, lots of cold water over it. But the cold water is powerless to extinguish it. In fact as the sand advocates will tell you, it merely serves to spread the fire. And that’s what happens when Claudette Colbert pours cold water over Ray Milland. "Pours cold water" is an understatement. She actually throws him into it. But does it extinguish his passion for her? Never! Even after Claudette has lost him his job, gone off for all-night car drives with Another, established herself in a luxury flat (with or without?), got a divorce, fallen in love with Brian Aherne, gone off on a yachting cruise (with), and told Mr. Milland that she never wants to see him again, he goes on loving her.

Brian Aherne plays opposite Ray Milland at the base of the triangle, and serves to demonstrate the axiom that people who are in Jove with the same person are not in love with one another. In his opening line he announces that he’s a cynic, but his more remunerative occupation, we learn later, is sitting in a law-office, from which he seems to draw a tidy weekly sum although his name comes after the "85", And his cynicism must surely be confined to office hours, or why does he think in terms of marriage and moonlight? and hamburgers (without)? re We admit it must be rather difficult for Claudette. After all, both men appeared equally eligible. In fact they’re both so faultlessly turned out (probably by the same tailor), and both so extremely bro&d-shouldered and well set up that, from the back view, it’s difficult to tell them apart, except that Ray Milland always wears a black Homburg and appears in his dressing-gown rather more often, which gives him a slight advantage. And Claudette Colbert still has the skin that advertisement copy-writers love to touch and eyelashes long enough to sweep the cob-webs from your heart -and, well-if you like that sort of thing this is the sort of that sort of thing that you are likely to like. We did, rather.

"The Internationale " HE composer of the "Internationale" was not a Russian. Though the Soviet Union officially adopted the song, it is of French origin, Wireless Weekly (Australia) points out. Eugene Potier, a woodworker from Lille, wrote the words (which have been —

translated into nearly every ‘anguage in the world) and Pierre Degeyter, a young Belgian spinner, 17 years later, set Potier’s poem to music. The song soon became popular among Socialists all over the world. A good many people claimed to have composed it, the most persistent of all being Degeyter’s brother, Adolphe. -EEE