The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 22, 1927, Page 13

A PEEK EACH WEEK . AT MOTION PICTURES MAN BAIT This has been done before under jess man-allur- ing titles, But never has it been done with Marle Prevost. That makes all the difference in the world —tho it may mot make a picture you will write home about. It igs one of the light-weight things that you wiil find in a story in the Saturday Evening Post. It has its virtues in these features; it allows provocating Marnie Prevost to act a type she does to perfection— the saucy, independent, I-can-take-care-of-myself type of girl who makes her own®way in the world on ber wits—and a shape if she owns one, Marie has both—and looks—and real ability as an actress which we hope our directors will utilize to better effect. Unfortunately she is an excellent—and shapely— comedienne. So Marie Prevost is given pictures that will display only these two virtues, In addition to the bathing suit scenes (in which whe used to grace California beaches for Mack Sen- mett) she is a girl, who, losing her job in a depart- ment store “for smackin’ a guy down for gettin’ fresh,” becomes a hostess earning a nickel a dance in a cheap hall “where guests come in on their good behavior and go out on the slightest provoca- tion.” If you know the “fairy tales for grown-up guys” they show in the movies, you can depend on ft that she becomes a “lady” before it’s all over. Oh, yes,-she also gets a millionaire! In America this opportunity is presented to every girl, like the president’s job is to every boy. It’s a wonderful country, you tell ’em. Sally Rand, one of the promising young junior stars, plays the tempiing Sheba to the tempted young Shekie played by Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Tho none of the personality nor abil- ity of his father is evident, young Fairbanks is well cast and does all the dumb part asks of him. Marie Prevost gives as as much reality as possible to her characterization. It is splendidly done. Too well done, in fact, for so dumb a picture. If she ever gets & story that will give her half a chance she will rise to recognition as a etar of first importance. All in all, “Man Bait” ig a lot of phooey. Not the worst kind, but bad enough. It’s rather well @one in spots, well photographed and as we men- tioned—it has Marie Prevost. That’s saying a jot. TWINKLETOES This ig a saccharine pot of goo. It is a British version of Pollyanna coming a few years too late for @is sophisticated age. Colleen Moore, as Twinkletoes, scatters little rays of sunshine in the lower depths of the London Lime- house district in a story by Thomas Burke. And #f this picture can be believed, what a helluva place the Limehouse district would be if it wasn’t for our little Twinkletoes! Maybe there are people who ean swallow thig sticky stuff without gagging, but this reviewer is not one of them. However, for fear of being of having only a hammer to qualify as a reviewer, we are glad to find something to praise in the picture. The praise fs due for the photography occasionally flashed. The producers of this iilm-flam have learned enough from the German productions (see ‘Variety”) to imi- tate with splendid results. Scenes photographed from various angles are so effective as to raise the film from absolute nonsense to otcasional artistry. ‘This is a welcome note in American pictures, in jus- tice to which it can be said there are hardly any Bo low as not to have something really worth while about them. If it isn’t the story, it is the acting, the costumes, sels or photograph, Tully Marshall, Kenneth Harlan and Gladys Brock- ‘woll take leading parts in support of Colleen Moore, The story—desplte supposed reallam—te 0 far Ps raking pce Sampo ot radeon be tough to swallow for even the most gullible, The faphy-——what a lollypop this one turned out to be! With the Authors H. G, WEISS, Box Maple and Sylvan, Oakland, Cal. “Lysistrata, The Future of Women, or Women and the Future,” by Ludovici, E. P. Dutton and Company, publishers, ia a very interesting little book to read-—and rather funny in spots. What- ever humor there is in the book, however, is totally unconscious humor, as Ladovici is wmiting in dead earnest and doesn’t realize how funny he sounds at times. It all simmers down to the fact that he evidently has what that Freudians would cal] a sex complex. Not because he writes about’ sex, you understand, but because he gets so het up about _ it. Note how naively he assumes his women would lose interest in life without the sex emotion to sus- tain them. This is partly, I believe, because Lado- vici sets too much store on an animal enjoyment of sex and is afraid of losing it. This reviewer re- members talking to a working stiff one night at Leighton’s Cafeteria, Oakland, about the evolution of the machine, and what part the machine might play im freeing women from the bearing of chil- dren. Instead of being intrigued by the possibilities lying in ectogenesis, the working gent got excited and abusive, declaring that “no contraption like that yas gonna come between him and his wife.” It is amusing to find, in more learned and veiled lan- guage, Ludovici expressing the same fear ag the ignorant working stiff. The author of “Lysistwata” seems to be conscious that women are going somewhere, and, with the help of an incubator, may get there. And that isn’t half the grief, Oscar. The he-men won’t be with them when they arrive. You can imagine what a shock such a thing would be to Ludovici who vis- ualizes himself as the he-men. So in revenge he brings his book” women to inevitable boredom and suicide as an awful warhing to real wives and mothers to stay contented with their lot—to say nothing of the he-men, The fear that the female of the species may get somewhere without him affects Ladovici’s reason- ing to such an extent that he forgets to be logical. To say that women, evolved thru science to the extent he imagines, would commit suicide because of sex frustration, is not straight thinking by any means, Do we contemplate suicide today because, let us say, We no longer enjoy the sex act as keenly as did our remote ancestors? Do we think life not worth the living because we miss to the full the savage thrill of crunching a pulsing threat beneath our teeth, because we mo longer savor the spurt- ing blood of the kill with all the abandonment of . an animal? The mere thought is absurd. What con- stitutes enjoyment hag changed. If a male today were to conduct himself in the sex relation as a caveman did he would be locked up in a peniten- tiary or an asylum. Compared to the average man he would be a freak. Yet the average man enjoys the sex act to the extent of his capacity. He does not, for instance, feel an intense longing to react emotionally as would a Neanderthal man. The real truth of the matter is that he would never miss what he, individually, had never possessed. While certain impulses might persist and manifest them- selves in a thousand vague ways, they would not be enough to color his conscious thinking, and cer- tainly not enough to drive him to suicide. As for missing the thrill of crunching on a pulsing throat, or the exquisite enjoyment of savoring spurting blood, all I have to say is that the average person finds the mere thought of euch things disgusting. Except for a few faddists, most of us want our meat cooked; and there is a growing army of vege- tarians—enough to cause widespread advertisement on the part of the meat trust—who consider dead fhesh not repulsive to eat at all. Ludovici may think he has come back to this argument in the fact that the time distance sep- erating a cave-man and an animal from the men of today ig immensely greater than the period of time he allots for the changes to take place in the wo men of whom he writes. But this only shows again that Ludovici is not a clear thinker. Because s¢l- ence has speeded up the change and does fn a hun- dred or two years what tt took natural means fo accomplish in a hundred thousand, does not imply that the change is less drastic or thorough. If Lado- vici’s women had evolved to the point where they had ceased to function sexually, and if this condi- tion were universal and had lasted long enough; that is, we will say, for several generationg or until the condition had become a matter’ of course; then by no process of logic could they be made to com- mit self-destruction for lack of something they had never personally experienced and could but in the vaguest maner visualiza. Ludovici commits another blunder. He makes no allowance for the terrible bolshevik. AH the changes he visualizes take place -under a profit system. Thore isn’t any revolution. Which, of course, is ebsurd, and shows that when he leaves his particu- lar field of applied science to speculate on social changes, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. What the proletarian revolution will do abowt up- setting his speculations as to the future of women isn’t the half of it, dearie. Still and all, the book | is worth reading and has quite a kick to it. One should read Mrs. Russell’s reply to Mr. Ludovici ° anent love making via physical contacts and have a@ good time all around. In the meantime the wo- men are on their way and Mr, Ludovici has my con- dolences. THE COMPANY STREET By EVELEN ALLEN ONG, dull, monotonous lines of company hoi low, small; without conveniences and comfor.- less; built along a stretch of barren yellow clay or fine black cinders. a ragged weed. For the song of birds, a shrill, insistent factory whistle; for a brook, the water tap at the corner; for perfume,a row of privies. Not a tree, hot a flower; scarcely Nature has furnished the homes of her work With every convenience and rich decoration That comfort could seek, or the eye might delight in: The earth for a couch, and its fruits for a banquet; Soft grass as a carpet with gray floral pattern; Thick trees for the walls, and green vines as the - hangings, Among which, the birds pipe a joy-song to freedom. Above them, an airy, high, blue-vaulted ceiling With chandeliered sun, moon and stars for its light- ing. But Man—when he houses his hard-working servants, Builds huts and dark hovels in unsightly places. Within, is discomfort; without, all is dreary: The street is a tread-mill for weary feet walking; Gaunt hunger and poverty stalk through the door- ways, While crimes and disease come crawling, creeping: Yet hear the Man brag—“I am the supreme one! I, the intelligent; I, the artistic!” come Te THE TINY WORKER No, 34 : A Weekly. Editor, Sydney Nadolsky, Grand Rapids, Mich. Johnny Red, Assistant Editor. Vol, 1. Saturday, January 22, 1927 WHAT RO you EQUALITY IN AMERICA CHRISTMAS ‘ —_— By Sidney Nadoisky, Grand Rapids, Mich. ee what hap- to our dower it was six o’clock in the morning. Rapids Pio- The boy went to work in the milf a 2 the it was ten o’clock in the morning. a So The boss rode in his fine sedan car;_ ‘we make issue in honor of those ee cee tlever Grand Rap- ‘atked about ids Tiny Workers. And smoked a big fat cigar. WEL MAYRE, It was twelve o'clock, the boy had his 7 WHat DO dinner, OU FELLOWS | A black piece of bread and butter. 7? fai . At twelve-thirty the boy went back Grant ‘Rapids Poe | With hie head still In a fut a er. neers writes this: uf Because his father got $20 a week And his mother was very iti. i The boss went out in his limousine And had a fine chicken renee Then bg yd out to pla the Pioneers watch Saying he surely feit og Ag than ever. for the TINY ctr tae soder" GOOD BOY, sID! very much, but That was fine. And it makes you wa not enough Fino f of this special Issue of the Rapids Pioneers. Come again! 7 VACATION By James Badaluco. I don’t like vaca- tions because I have to sell papers while’ very rich boys and girls have lots of fun playing and skating. Rich boys and girls have it easy while 1 have to sell papers from early morning till late at nieht. Vacation is for the rich boys and girls but it is not for ‘the workers’ children who woul rather go to school than sell papers. Join the Young Pioneers and fight for a real vacation. There should be a Pioneer organiza- tion in every city. You bet there should, Jimmy, And there will be soon, too! Between the is- sues of the Young Comrade we like to hear a lot about the Pioneers ali over the country. Why can’t the TINY WORKER be given more space?”" BUT, HEY KIDS, if the. TINY WORKER was larger it be the TINY WORKER, would it? Anyway, if you fellows send in much stuff, why we will have to print a larger TINY WORKER. Come on now — force us to make it larger! HEY, NEXT WEEK! wouldn't Henry Sampolin- sky of Grand Rap- ids sent us the dandiest little poem. We'll = let you see it next week, Oh, — * you'll like ‘it! a