Evening star., 1940-02-10

is the heart-Warming. human story
caught up in web of circum-
stance and facing their lives in
normal manner, unaided by pipe
dream, hokum or other Hollywood
handmaidens.
Remember the Night" to be
sure, has about it enough aspects
of the ordinary, the oft-seen, that
it might have provided many pit
fall for its makers. But Director
Mitchell Leisen and Script Writer
Preston Sturges have been adroit
indeed in their handling of famil-
lar theme. They have, with the
help of a pair of top-notch per-
formances by Barbara StanWyck
(even though you never thought
you'd see that here) and Fred Mac
Murray, given us fresh and COM
pletely engaging yarn.
Here we have situation at the
outset which may frighten you with
the belief that you are about to see
something utterly screwball or
something full of bathos. in either
case painfully trite. But don't you
be frightened for a moment. Mr..
Sturges, may the fates be kind to
him for it. was not consulting any
book of cliches. The boy who meets
the girl is an assistant district at
torney and the girl is a shoplifter
he is trying to send to Jail, all right,
but that old one is just spring.
board for a novel tale with tug
at the heart.
The lass, we may as we'll tell you
right now, does not renounce her
life of crime for love the instant her
glance falls upon the handsome
young assistant district attorney.
And we do not even know from
Remember the Night" whether or
not the lad and the lass are going
to live happily ever after, which is
another point distinctly to this
films credit.
What we know is that the young
man feels sorry for the girl, ar
ranges with bondsman to have
her released from Jail over the
Christmas holidays. The bonds
man, though not too appreciative of
the finer viewpoint, is friendly
citizen, so he delivers the young
lady at her prosecutors apartment
on the eve of that gentleman's de-
parture for a holiday at his Indiana
home. There's nothing else to be
done with her so he takes her
back home in Indiana.
There is in all of this, of course,
much humor. much of that light
banter with which the movie
makers mot to mention number
of other people, feel that romance
should be treated. And those mo-
ments when Remember the Night"
is just having fun are completely
engaging ones.
The picture is set apart, however,
by it's account of the more serious
aspects of this romance. 1t is at
it's best when it is revealing the
little shoplifter's reaction to readily
offered friendship, to the af1ec-
tionate warmth of a home life she
has never known. Mr.. Leison and
Miss Stanwyck never let the char
acter slip away; she's still shop
litter, and not at all sure she will
not always be, when she leaves
Indiana to go on trial again. 1t is
so very pleasant to find cinema
characters behaving as human be-
ings. .
The Capitol's stage show, Dance
Crazy" is one of those vaudeville
affairs which manages to escape
being boring without approaching
the spectacular. 1t has Art Brown,
who claims he is on the air at $50
o'clock every morning, though we'd
never know about that, to get the
customers in a congenial mood
from his perch at the organ with
community sing. And it has
various people who contribute vari-
Gus styles of what you would expect
in a show of this name-dancing.
Best among the dancers is Me-
lissa Mason, who also most closely
fits the title of this affair with her
amazing contortionistic didoes. And
there are some ballroom novelties
by the Stadlers and varied routines
by the Rhythm Rockets. And for
the comedy touch there are AL Cor
don and his Racketeers, a dog turn
with some hilarious moments, and
the Three Sailors, whose forte is
slapstick, performed fortissimo.