A New Picture

Bluff is a generally interesting picture, though contradictory. At one moment it derides its subject; the next it rescues the heroine from a mess by bluff. A young dress designer, unable to get ahead in any other way, pretends to be a well- known modiste, and while success rolls in on one side, the police roll in on the other--for her assumed namesake has been involved in Red Cross frauds. The girl's prosecution is pushed by a political boss anxious to hush her up in her fight to make him pay for crippling her brother. But a young attorney saves her by a stall. Artificial but well-wrought complications carry the story along. Agnes Ayres looks pretty but placid as the girl, and Antonio Moreno seems a bit too romantic for a mere lawyer.

Anthology

Robert E. Sherwood, critic for Life, has written a volume* comprehensively entitled The Best Moving Pictures of 1922-23, also Who's Who in the Movies, and Yearbook of the American Screen. Critic Sherwood himself admits that the value of such a work is questionable. And it is doubtful if the average cinema patron, will care for an appraisal of the best pictures of a year ago, now that they have come and gone. But the book will be of no small value to the professional reviewer of the screen, as well as the earnest student of the cinema, if there be any such. It is filled with information, treated with a saving grace of humor. The writer lists the best pictures within the period covered by his book, as follows : Nanook of the North, Grandma's Boy, Blood and Sand, The Prisoner of Zenda, The Eternal Flame, Shadows, Oliver Twist, Robin Hood, Peg o' My Heart, When Knighthood Was in Flower, Driven, The Pilgrim, Down to the Sea in Ships, The Covered Wagon, Hollywood, Merry-Go-Round. These Mr. Sherwood adduces to show that the film industry can produce works of art. To each he gives a compact critical survey, a short recital of the plot and a description of the manner of its production that is perhaps the most interesting feature of each chapter. In addition he gives honorable mention to a number of photoplays, lists the best individual performances by players, submits the pictures that brought the largest receipts, and treats of censorship, cinema companies, etc. Besides handy biographies in the "Who's Who" section, he adds a cinema vocabulary that is indeed edifying.

* Published by Small, Maynard, $2.50.