Cinema: The New Pictures Dec. 19, 1927

(2 of 2)

Wild Geese, brushing across a cobwebbed sky, become for Judith Gare the symbol of a freedom she achieves when her father's avarice finally traps him into death. Spots of melodrama, blotches of theatrical emotion do less, to mar the story than to prove that sincere acting can make these defects seem trivial. Belle Bennett (whose reward for a fine performance in Stella Dallas has been a succession of mediocre roles) and Eve Southern (who wore dark hair and a fixed expression in The Gaucho) are competent to effect a more than satisfactory transposition of Martha Ostenso's bestselling, prize-winning fiction.

Jungle Gods is one more travel picture (this time African and made by a Captain von Hoffman) in which savages display smirking artificialities much like those so constantly practiced by semi-civilized migrates to the cinema lots of Southern California. As they go through the motions of tribal ritual—king-crowning, lion-hunting, getting married, they manage not to fall into the anticipated postures of improper ingratiation. But they are always ready to roll their eyeballs, with evident satisfaction, at the camera man, thus detracting from the illusion that their curious behaviour is entirely unaffected.