CINEMA
,1V14EN we go to see a glamorous star we expect nowadays to find her where we left her, playing more or less exactly the same role in more or less exactly the same picture and being neither more nor less able to act. It comes as quite a shock, therefore, to be Confronted with a Rita Hayworth who can take an emotional scene in her stride, who Consents to be haggard and ugly, who can convince one that she is the tramp she is Supposed to_be. Miss Sadie Thompson, based ,on a story of Somerset Maugham's, starts badly with Miss Hayworth, flaunting and Madly gay, arriving on a tropical island full Of sex-starved Marines, those old familiars e have learned not to love. Headed by Aldo Ray, they behave as anticipated, and jolly orgies—there seem to be no officers in tilis detachment—take place, which both embarrass and appal. However, when lose Ferrer, as a fanatical moral reformer, reveals that the lady was once one of the Iftpest divers in a Honolulu dive the film Sets off the rutted track and Miss Hayworth gets down to acting. She is extraordinarily good, although the goodness may seem better than it is for having surprised us. With Mr. Ferrer, who first reforms her and then assaults her, she shows unexpected sensitive- ness, and Columbia can be complimented un giving her the chance to be other than Plain seductive. The direction, by Curtis Bernhardt, is excellent, although at first one is too stunned by the uninhibited irregu- larities of Marine life to appreciate it. Yet Oven when dealing with juvenile lust it has kts finer points and tells the story with enough imagination to make its incredi- bili ties credible.
There is not a credible foot in Phantom of the Rue Morgue, or perhaps it is that I have grown too old for gorillas. There IS something rather sad about the average adult's incapacity to be frightened by films. Only very rarely do the flames of fear lick Out from the screen to singe the nerves, and then the cause is usually something intang-
Certainly apes on the rampage have lost their magic for me, Not that the creature in this picture is a fair test, for it is desperately like a man dressed up as an ape, its leather face carved in simple lines, its Coat lack-lustre; but I feel that even if it Were a living anthropoid I should view it Without alarm. This is sad somehow. The film, which is in sleazy 3D, is, of course, Pure melodrama, a series of screams strung On a script which, though built on the frame- Work of Edgar Allan Poe's famous story, Plumbs the depths of bathos. Claude bauphin, Patricia Medina, Karl Malden guld Steve Forrest struggle bravely but
ineffectively and Roy del Ruth, a good director, fails on this occasion to surmount the obstacles in his path. And who shall blame him? It is not easy to be subtle about half a dozen identical murders in a row, and with a police inspector of such consum- mate stupidity on his hands he cannot be censured for first wringing them and the washing them cleah of the whole thing.
Lucky Me is a CinemaScope musical starring Doris Day, Robert Cummings and Phil Silvers, and concerns itself with the troubles of a destitute vaudeville team who to keep alive, have to work as servants in a hotel where they tangle with a song writer who is flirting with the daughter of a millionaire who wants to put money in show-business. Misunderstandings, imper- sonations, the whole gamut of musical comedy situations are here in abundance, but the dialogue is felicitous and Miss Day a radiator of joy, so that although the songs are below standard there is a feeling of music in the air, of spring and youth and carefreedom which is extremely pleasant. The film has been directed by John Donahue and it goes at a spanking pace.
VIRGINIA GRAHAM
Previous page
