OCR Text |
Show Ian r?J. 1L 1 f'v V i(tmM fit Ld m k;;it;.irji s ' " - - '- Notes of an Innocent Bystander: The Magic Lanterns: The cinema has gone to war, all the newcomers being armed to the teeth . . . "Wake Island" is one of the most meritorious meritori-ous of the battle stories. It sticks to the grim facts of the case, with no sugary heroics. It shows the marines are a tough and glorious outfit even with their backs to the wall. Brian Donlevy, Robert Preston, Pres-ton, MacDonald Carey, et al, snap it up . . . "The World at War" is a newsreel catalogue of all the outrages out-rages the easy-going world overlooked over-looked for a decade. It shows the snatch of Manchuria as the first act of a Jap plan of stick-up that built up to the surprise of Pearl Harbor . . . "Across the Pacific" is hairy-chested hairy-chested meller of the spy school. Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor and Sidney Greenstreet, the aces of "The Maltese Falcon," are reunited here to give your spine another fast workout. work-out. Here again the Japs perform their familiar role of sneaks . . . "Berlin Correspondent" means well, but it's as far-fetched as anything to come out of that town since Goeb-bels Goeb-bels opened up his free service to the dopier U. S. newspapers. The Wireless: Ambass. Grew didn't fool around with any pep talk in his report from Tokyo. The Japs are tough, he warned, and won't quit till they're carried out. The ambassador am-bassador seemed a little gloomy about the way too many of us are pretending the war is no worse than a bad cold . . . Rex Stout deserves the biggest public. His propaganda spiels are tip-top. There is moxie in his voice as well as his wordage . . . The Goebbels gabble now being be-ing broadcast to the Nazis urges them to "forget how to be unbiased and just" and work up more hate for the enemy, especially the Britons. Brit-ons. Telling Nazis how to be unjust is as unnecessary as telling skunks how to smell. The Story Tellers: Frank King-don King-don takes care of the isolationists who got patriotic after Pearl Harbor. Har-bor. In "Dangers of a False Peace," in Free World, he points out they kept bleating "peace" and "ignored every voice that cried of our danger from those who kill and enslave civilians as well as soldiers." And there are those who are running for congress on a platform of that same ignorance! . . . Elsie McCormick reports "Boston's Fight Against Rumors" Ru-mors" in the Mercury. It is very odd very odd, indeed that so many b,its of chit-chat, calculated to distiv'rli us in war time, can be , 1 .trac0''haplr to the Nazi shortwavers . . . Pic's editorial, "Coughlin on Parade," is crowded with dynamite. Clark Gable has been praised by the army and the press for doing it The Hard Way nevertheless, Clark is receiving some nasty letters let-ters from females throughout the land . . ; Claiming that The Hard Way "isn't starting in as Corporal" . . . The fact is this: Any man entering en-tering the Officer Candidate School in Miami Beach is made a corporal at once. The army does this so that every man starts off equal . . . However, as soon as a man begins classes he loses the temporary rating rat-ing assigned him at the induction and from then on, until his graduation, gradua-tion, he is addressed simply as "Mr." ... In short, he is not Corporal Cor-poral Gable, but Mr. Gable ... If and when he graduates he will come out a 2nd Lt. ... In the last war, Gable probably doesn't recall, being a 2nd Looey was really doing it The Hard Way . . . The quip then went: "What's your idea of a good time, soldier?" . . . "My idea of a good time," was the retort, "is watching a boatload of 2nd Lieutenants sinking!" sink-ing!" Typewriter Ribbons: James Coz-zens Coz-zens Gould: He had a mind that hit and ran and got away . . . Ann Hunt: Better to carry the torch of liberty and truth than have it come up and burn you from behind . . . Margaret Culkin Banning: The fire burnt out and slept in its own ashes .... Correction: Kay Riley should have had the credit for: It's a wise bride who knows whether it's Cupid or Conscription . . . Austin O'Malley: It's twice as hard to crush a half truth than a whole lie . . . Time: Shocbrush-mustached Tom Dewey . . . Margaret L. Run-beck: Run-beck: The baby opened her little pink mitten of a hand . . . R. L. Stevenson: She sat around sipping the conversation with her eyes . . M. R. Eliot: She looks for trouble as if it paid her a salary . . . R. L. Martens: Criticism is what you get when you have everything else. Eleven others from Rudy Vallce's orchestra are following him into the service . . . Petitions seeking 10,000 signatures are being circulated among sporting circles here in behalf be-half of former boxer Ernie Haas, doing 20 years for murdering a Nazi attache. Ho wants his freedom to join the Canadian Commandos. He's Canuck . . . James True, the j Washington "publicist" (as he pre- fcrs to call himself; who has been exploited in Time and elsewhere for his Fascist comments has opened offices in midtown Manhattan. |