The New Pictures

Night Nurse (Warner Bros.) is the kind of story that can be told most effectively in the cinema--a loosely constructed narrative, more informative than fictional until it veers into murder mystery for the purpose of a climax. The most interesting part of the picture is the beginning, in which Barbara Stanwyck puts on a nurse's uniform, repulses the advances of an interne, makes friends with a flip little blonde nurse, treats a bootlegger's bullet wound without putting the case on record and faints after watching someone die on the operating table. It is when she has become a graduate nurse that the picture becomes, without warning, a melodrama; but because the early sequences have made the nurse come to life as a character, there is no absurdity in this less plausible portion of a night nurse's memoirs. Engaged to care for two small children, she finds that they are starving to death, suspects a doctor's plot to murder them. Implicated in the scheme is the household chauffeur (Clark Gable) who cuffs the nurse on the jaw when she disobeys his orders. When the hero of the picture, the 'legger whom she befriended (Ben Lyon), enters the children's sickroom and points a gun at the chauffeur, audiences are likely to show a reaction which is rarely provoked in the cinema without the aid of cowboys, ropes, revolvers and Dirty Pete, the cattle rustler --to clap hands loudly and chuckle with relief. Well photographed, directed and acted, Night Nurse achieves a higher plane in the cinema than it did as a novel written for the drugstore trade by Dora Macy. This is partly because of the medium, partly because Actress Stanwyck's understanding portrayal makes the girl seem none the less charming when, in rueful contemplation of her bruised jaw, she relieves her feelings by thoughtfully murmuring, "The dirty, lousy----"

The Common Law (RKO Pathe). First essential of a problem play is a problem. Since the problem which is the excuse for this picture ceased to exist a long time ago, the play is consistently a bore. It concerns an artist's model who has had an affair with an American in Paris. This misdemeanor makes her very reluctant about marrying a painter, with whom she next becomes intimate. Further obstacles to the wedding are provided by the painter's sister, a severely conventional socialite. When the model's first lover (Lew Cody, grown a trifle fat) reappears, the situation requires the obvious solution of sixth reel matrimony. The outmoded quandaries of The Common Law (derived from a novel which Robert William Chambers wrote in 1913) cause Joel McCrea to look slightly disgruntled as the painter, provide nice surroundings but mediocre dramatic material for Constance Bennett.

The three daughters of Actor Richard Bennett looked, a few years ago, as though they might later be something of a problem, but things turned out to make the Bennetts, like the Barrymores, a legendary family in the theatre. Barbara, second daughter, was the first to go into the movies, before she became a dancing partner of the late Maurice (Maurice Oscar Louis Mouvet). Now she is the wife of Radio Tenor Morton Downey, who last week became temporarily blind from exposing his eyes to a sunlamp. Joan, youngest daughter, married when she was 16, divorced at 18, now gets $2,000 a week from Fox (current picture: Hush Money). Constance, most spectacular of the three, has ash-blonde hair, big round eyes, bow-lips and an expletive vocabulary reputed to be the equal of her father's. As a debutante, she was one of the most provocative college prom girls of the Scott Fitzgeraldized era. Her second husband, Millionaire Philip Plant, caused her to desert a promising cinema and stage career.

When she signed an RKO Pathe contract in 1929 Constance was shrewd enough to insist on a ten-week holiday every year. Recently she spent this holiday working for Warner Brothers at $30,000 a week, highest salary ever paid to a cinemactress. Last week she left Hollywood for a trip to Europe with a quick stop-over in Manhattan. Her companion on train and boat (adjacent staterooms) was the Marquis de la Falaise et de la Coudray, estranged husband of Gloria Swanson.

When he appeared in Hollywood in the entourage of Cinemactress Swanson five years ago, the Marquis became acclimated quickly. When Cinemactress Swanson lost interest in him, he gave proof of a shrewd business head by securing Constance Bennett for RKO Pathe, where he was hired to supervise and direct talkies made for exportation to France. An alliance too open to be a scandal had existed between the Marquis and Constance before and since. On embarking for Europe last week, Cinemactress Bennett said there were no plans for a marriage, implied that there might be after Cinemactress Swanson gets her divorce, due Nov. 6. Asked whether he would spend part of his vacation with Constance Bennett, the long-lashed Marquis, grinning, replied, "Well, what do you think?"

The Man in Possession (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer) is exactly the right sort of play for Robert Montgomery. It allows him to wear well-tailored clothes and a becoming air of irresponsibility which, even in competition with a cast of seasoned British character actors, are acceptable substitutes for an English accent and a familiarity with Mayfair drawing rooms. The play itself upholds the pleasant tradition of parlor, boudoir and bathroom comedy by developing a trick situation and then extracting comedy that depends more on predicament than on characters. Montgomery is the black-sheep of a middle-class family. Ordered to leave home, he secures a position as sheriff's officer and is assigned to take possession of a charming house belonging to a charming lady who, he presently learns, is his brother's fiancee. Persuaded to act as her butler, he spills gravy gracefully on his brother and father, performs other and more intimate offices of domestic assistance which have advantageous results. The Man in Possession is one of those forgettable comedies which have teasingly memorable moments: for example, the one in which, while the other members of his family are angrily pretending not to know him, Montgomery's mother (Beryl Mercer) says "Thank you, dear," when he hands her the potatoes. Listed as a contributor of "additional dialog" to The Man in Possession is funny Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, who recently expressed remorse at having "cheated" Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer by receiving $104,000 for "touching up" two pieces in a year.

Murder by the Clock (Paramount). In a mystery story, the suspense usually surrounds the identity of a criminal. In a detective story, the suspense is caused by efforts to catch the criminal. Murder by the Clock is therefore a detective story since the audience soon becomes aware that the criminal in it is a bewitching blonde (Lilyan Tashman) whom no one would ever suspect of inciting her friends to murder, so long as she refrained from narrowing her eyes in a certain way. A vicious character of the worst sort, she starts by telling her husband that if his aunt were out of the way he would get a fat inheritance. Next she suggests to her lover that it would be nice if someone did away with her husband. Finally she suggests to a half-wit relative that he might as well do something to her lover. When the half-wit has done it, a detective (William Boyd) takes the lady into custody.

A good detective story often makes an audience laugh louder than a clever comedy, since laughter is the method most people use for pretending not to be scared, or for relief after moments of vicarious terror. Audiences at Murder by the Clock chuckle and squeal as they are meant to do. Good shot: Lilyan Tashman narrowing her eyes to show how much she enjoys watching the half-wit strangling her lover.

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