Word: third
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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...winter of 1937-38 a frightened man named Richard Whitney tried to peg the stock of Distilled Liquors Corp. at 9. He failed and went to jail. Last week, having totted up its third consecutive deficit, $74,149 in 1938, Distilled Liquors (applejack, bourbon, rye) announced it was going to expand into the importing business (16 varieties of wine, three whiskies). Its stock...
...third of a nation" (Paramount) is an adaptation of the Federal Theatre Project's most successful play (TIME, Jan. 31, 1938). It was directed by Dudley Murphy (Emperor Jones) and produced in Astoria, L. I.'s Eastern Service Studios by Harold Orlob. Its purpose: to denounce bad housing...
...general the movies may be applauded for trying to attack, instead of to compensate for, U. S. social ills. As examples of a trend, Boy Slaves and ". . . one-third of a nation" are commendable. Unfortunately, they are also individual products, to be judged according to their merits, and as such they are dishearteningly trivial...
First requisite of a picture with a moral is that it make its moral seem important. Second is that it make its moral seem :rue. Boy Slaves fails in truth because its bad characters are not human but monstrous. ". . . one-third of a nation" fails in importance because its characters do not seem worth bothering about. And in addition to being inherently feeble, both pictures suffer from amateurish acting, writing and direction...
Hollywood often wastes superb treatment on worthless themes, sometimes miserably botches good themes. Boy Slaves and ". . . one-third of a nation" are likely to discourage Hollywood from tackling like matters, for if these pictures are financial failures, producers will blame it on the material rather than their methods...