Cinema: Great Expectations

Great Expectations (Universal). If any scenarist but Charles Dickens had brought the synopsis of this picture to a Hollywood producer, he would have been labeled a clown. An implausible rigmarole about old convicts, London swells, blacksmiths, eccentric old ladies, orphans with mysterious benefactors and gypsy servant girls, animated by coincidence and honeycombed with nonsense, its only similarity to a salable cinema narrative is a banal happy ending. Its main plot line, concerning the love of a young man, Pip, for an arrogant debutante, Estella, is confused by being intermittently subordinated to a mystery story.

The mystery story, about the convict Magwitch and his life-long feud with the blackguard who stole his wife, is blurred by the fact that Magwitch never seems quite sure whether he is villain or hero. In addition to this, the characters have names like Pocket, Jaggers, Gargery and Pumblechook. In spite of all these eccentricities. Great Expectations is superb cinema entertainment. It should go a long way toward enlarging even further the prestige of Charles Dickens who has lately become the most fashionable author in Hollywood.*

Expertly condensed by Gladys Unger and directed by Stuart Walker, the task of preserving the vitality of Great Expectations rests principally on the cast. Most memorable contributions to a gallery of 19th Century human oddities are made by Henry Hull, as monkey-faced Magwitch; Florence Reed, as monstrous old Miss Havisham; Jane Wyatt as cold-hearted Estella. Good shot: Magwitch eating cold porkpie in a graveyard.

*Now in production are David Copperfield (M-G-M), The Mystery of Edwin Drood (Universal).