New-York tribune., 1919-03-16
The Search for the
Perfect Picture PIav


ness equivalent to that of those YES.
teryear vamps who, having arranssa
to take poison at the head of A;gh,
OF stairs (centre), used to create s. as~-
sation by having a portiere give wsv
with them and wrapping their las,
agonies in it as they rolled down. q,
course, the distinction of present-d.u
vamps is that they dispense with ~
wrappings, but, frankly, we cannot \.
lieve that our heroine, for that -
markably exciting first evening" a,
French family life, would not h.v,
been furnished by her protectors VII,
at least petticoat--even if she ha,
none in that bundle of clothes that .h,
brought from the circus. Nine. Ns,,
nova has presumably calculated ths,
the little 1.-THE white figure, writh,rs
and plunging in the dusky interiors
would have an extremely bizarse ef.
feet, and she is right there; the eAee,
IS so bizarre and so utterly witbon,
reasonable provocation that II fo~,.,
the first step by which the picture !.
turned into nothing more genuine thsn
kind of Sultana ballet. We are 70,
almost any sort of passion-in.the.
desert except that which has been oh.
vlously arranged to be thrilling in mar.
iors, and our fancy refuses to follow
our heroine further than Alp;ers
where it had not yet dawned on hor
what strange creature she was.
We wound up our search with @Tbs
Lion and the Mouse" which in ;tx
struggle to tell an involved and not
very credible story intelligibly at
tempts long and prayerfuIly to hu-
mamie it, but by singularly old fash.
loned methods; for at least three ve.,.
we have not seen people so frequently
depart proceed and arrive-the msre
number of meals interrupted by crucia,
news is maddening. There remains
however, faithful, straightforward at
tempt to get upon the screen the SORT
OF story which ought never to be there
10 our mind picture which takea
place indoors might almost as we'll ro,
take place at all. And though ouy
mind is frequently knocked fiat bv AN
indoor plcture-for when achieved ner.
lection comes in at the door the theorv
that knows what is good for itself 3ies
out OF the window-"The Lion and the
mouse" delivers no such punch. Its
punch as play was delivered in tho
big quarrel scene, with the actual
clash OF word on word, stroke upon
ringing stroke of actual vocal attack
and retort in piled up tone. Nothing Of
this kind, of course, was possible upon
the screen. And to be quite bonest
we had sought it not in a sincere
quest for the perfect picture play: We
had simply fed for comfort to hHee
Joyce.
To watch her act is food and drink
and rest in the shade, with skill that
seems so simple does she combine note
after note into the smoothly running
tune. We like to wonder just HOY. far
the strength of her personality sub
Jects all parts to itself or how far she
accommodates herself to all parts. With
simply a keencr sense of their neccssi-
ties than is usual-for instance, ve
have never seen her play a girl who
had not some deep, underlying sugres-
tion of brains, of strong mental life.
md rya lin an
wantonly puts this over on helpless
womanly heroines or whether she d.
vines and brings it out. We hope il is
pardonable for US to say that this ef-
feet of having occasionally thought
about something is peculiarly fortunate
in "The Lion and the Mouse" whose
Shirley Rossmore is supposed to h a
writer. We all know how the acasass
cast for one of these queer perNns
generally and quite successfully en-
deavors to keep her from looking al al
authoress-y; Miss Joyee's Shirley hss
the dignity of q person who makes her
own living without any less of she
feminine mystery which is SO much
stronger in her than in any eurl-shaker
in the world.
Well, we were prepared for Hiss
Joyce, but, fresh from tho mortrary
wreaths of "Little Women we were
not prepared for Mr.. Nagel. To see
two people so equipped and alert play
ing into one another's hands so skill
fully, so delicately, with such freedom
and richness of suggestion as to create
q whole background which has never
entered the plots poor wooden head,
this is simply entrancing. Il is almost
enough to make us say. like faresgn
screen celebrity whose dinner was just
being trundled across the restaurant in
reverential wheeled wagons ~Ah. -
scenario--it's dc scenario you r,Akei
over such fuss! An what is It, der
de scenario? Do lille cart for &c
dishes!.