. 1 CONTEMPORARY ARTS
CINEMA
TSunday in August." (Academy.)--,, Branded." (Plaza.) HE charming film at the Academy, which is written and produded by the author of Open City. Paisa and Bicycle Thieves. M. Sergio Amidei, is quite simply what it says it is, the story-of a hot Sunday In August. We follow the fortunes of live groups of people, most
o f whom leave Rome for the seaside solace of Ostia, there to pursue 'their separate destinies in a surging throng of ebullient and semi-
n ude humanity. Very little happens and only in one instance do 'the stories overlap, but the enchanting touches of comedy, the brief Itragedies, the penetrating insight into man at his most gregarious and least self-conscious, not to mention the sea, the sop and the sand, make this a memorable offering. The players are nearly all 'non-professional, and give vigorous, refreshing performances, and by the end of this baking Sunday one shares with them not only 'heir lives but also their happy fatigue and their sunburns.
* * * * In the same programme is an art feature, some of Goya's pictures and drawings accompanied by Segovia on his guitar. Impressive, but one yearns for colour.
* * * * •
Branded is a Western more intricately planned than is usual (Inasmuch as the protagonist, a gunman played by Mr. Alan Ladd, succeeds, by having a birthmark tattooed on his shoulder, in persuading a rich cattle-owner, Mr. Charles Bickford, that he is his long-lost son, a son who was kidnapped in childhood. Thus does he hope to inherit vast wealth and to settle down—which is the only thing gunmen seem to care about these days. Unfortunately, however, he falls in love with his soi-disant sister, Miss Mona Free- man, and the heart which once beat with great granite thumps melts like butter, infecting as it does so our hero's equally granite con- science. Not content with remorse, Mr. Ladd, in whose rugged beauty it is difficult to detect any thought processes whatever, tears off into a mountain full of Mexican bandits to re-kidnap the rancher's real son. Though loth to leave his foster-father, the tempestuous Mr. Joseph Calleia, the youth is dragged back, Mexican accent and all, into the slightly bewildered bosom of his rightful parents, and with everything neat and tidy in the ethical line Mr. Ladd heaves a big sigh and gets a big kiss.
Of its kind this is an excellent film. It is efficiently directed by Mr. Rudolph Mate, the action is swift, the scenery magnificent, and Mr. Ladd is always, thank heavens, Mr. Ladd, god-like, poker-faced
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