" Sing as We Go." At the Plaza IN farce
there is always a tendency to social hatred, and in melodrama an opposite tendency to a kind of social hero- worship. The farcical hero is surrounded by more or less grotesque types whom he eventually outwits ; he is Ishmael revenging himself on a society which he both hates and fears. In melodrama the characters are all, in a sense, heroic ; even the villain, with his glittering jewellery and his twirled moustaches, invites the audience to gaze with awe and envy at a world of masterful passions far removed from the drabness of everyday life. An unusual merit of Sing as We Go, written by J. B. Priestley for Miss Gracie Fields and directed by Basil Dean, is that its farcical spirit is combined with a shrewdly observant realism not distorted by disguised contempt.
Mr. Priestley has not troubled to construct much of a plot—his story simply follows the adventures at Blackpool of Grace Platt, an out-of-work mill-girl--but he has devised a handsome variety of comedy episodes. The boarding- house sequence, after Grace has taken a job as maid-of-all- work, is a good example of the film's style. It ends in the slapstick manner with Grace emptying a plate of soup over a stout boarder's head ; but it gives also a vivid and pungent impression of the whole atmosphere of one of Blackpool's more democratic holiday establishments. Afterwards the story takes Grace through a variety of other jobs—as a clairvoyante's assistant, as a toffee-seller, and as a conjurer's " vanishing lady " ; and Miss Fields—though it was a mistake to give her a seriously sentimental song towards the end—goes through it all with her usual verve and infectious good humour. She is well supported, too, by a carefully chosen cast ; and Mr. J. R. Gregson, as the landlady's furtive husband, and Miss Make O'Neill, as the clairvoyante, are conspicuous in making the most of brief appearances.
GENERALLY RELEASED NEXT WEEK.
Viva Villa! Wallace Beery as the Mexican bandit. Story frankly idealized but full of graphically adventurous episodes spaciously produced and finely photographed.
CHARLES DAvv.
Previous page
