New Pictures: Cinema

Beau Geste (Ronald Colman, Noah Beery). P. C. Wren’s immoderately popular novel of the French Foreign Legion has been turned into a brilliant, colorful and exciting screen melodrama by Herbert Brenon. The director has not been afraid to make his romance of three brothers, who loved each other enough to sacrifice life and honor, just a bit brutal, just a little lacking in the usual rose-colors of screen romantics. As a result, the film has, in addition to an honestly exciting story and great visual beauty, something of the grime and the brutality and the torturing heat of its Saharan setting that gives it a surprising honesty. Noah Beery, as a brutal sergeant; William Powell, as a sneaking legionaire and Ronald Colman in the title role, are particularly fine.

The Show-Off (Ford Sterling, Lois Wilson). George Kelly’s brilliant, sardonic comedy of West Philadelphia has lost its ironic bite in the process of transfer to the screen, but, under the competent directorial hand of Malcolm St. Clair, it becomes a quite diverting cinema comedy. The story of the boasting clerk who married into an unwilling family and finally made his bluff good, is followed with considerable care, and a gratifying amount of the original satire and characterization remain. The acting is excellent.

The Amateur Gentleman (Richard Barthelmess). A sudden fortune! And the son of an innkeeper sallies forth to beau-brummel it over London. He does, too, and marries a most patrician vestal, as well. Grimly sincere, Richard Barthelmess gives his public joy, as he floats on the clouds of this Cinderella romance. Unfortunately, the big scene, a steeplechase, precedes the finals by several reels, so that the triumphal tide ebbs somewhat toward the end. Quaint scenes and costumes of 1819 help to retain interest.

Battling Butler (Buster Keaton). As a pampered millionaire lad whom circumstance forces into the bumpy career of pugilism, Buster Keaton evokes many a loud laugh. As usual, he sustains percussion upon repercussion with perfect immobility of countenance. Surrounded as it is, by so many serious strivings after sophistication, this picture, beautiful silliness, provides a unique oasis for the weary wanderer in search of mental relaxation.