The Thirteenth Chair (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer). Like all stories which depend upon contrivance rather than on character, murder mysteries age fast. What is remarkable about The Thirteenth Chair is not that it is antiquated but that it should have withstood at all the fierce corrosion of two theatrical decades. Pathé made it as a silent in 1919, Metro as a talkie with Leila Hyams and Conrad Nagel in 1929.
In the present version Dame May Whitty is the psychic—a term which is itself a hallowed souvenir—who tries to solve a murder by making the twelve possible suspects hold hands in the dark. Things look bad for Nell O'Neill (Madge Evans) when John Wales (Henry Daniell) is stabbed at the seance, but clear up when, at the next psychic session, Dick Crosby (Thomas Beck) uses lampblack to prove that naughty Dr. Mason (Charles Trowbridge) was not holding hands. The Thirteenth Chair still saves a septuagenarian shiver for the moment when Madame La Grange reveals the murder knife stuck in the ceiling, but as dramaturgy it is more convincingly dead than any of Dr. Mason's victims.
Make Way for Tomorrow (Paramount). The fact that a good story simply told is worth more than all the box-office names, production numbers and expensive sets in Hollywood is one of those plain truths which the cinema industry finds hardest to assimilate. Consequently, if Make Way for Tomorrow makes a fortune for its producers, Hollywood can be expected to exhibit amazement. No amazement is in order. Taking a subject about which everyone has speculated—the financial insecurity of old age—the picture examines the case of Barkley Cooper (Victor Moore) and his wife Lucy (Beulah Bondi). Adapted by Vina Delmar from Josephine Lawrence's novel, directed by Leo McCarey (Ruggles of Red Gap), the story is presented with rare cinematic honesty. It is acted by Victor Moore, in his first serious cinema role, and seasoned Beulah Bondi, with that effortless perfection which, because it can come only from long experience, all younger actors lack. The result is one of the most persuasive documents about an old couple since the late Ring Lardner wrote Golden Honeymoon.
When Lucy and Barkley Cooper summon their grown children to announce that the bank has foreclosed the mortgage on their house, they are sure the children will provide a remedy. The children are less positive. George is trying to put a daughter through college. Cora's husband is poor. Nellie's husband's business is bad. Robert has all he can do to look after himself. The plan they finally work out is for Lucy to live with George while Barkley goes to stay with Cora.
Broken by the first separation in their 50 years of marriage, Barkley and Lucy make bad visitors. Lucy interferes with her daughter-in-law's bridge parties. Barkley gets in wrong with Cora. When the children decide, as an alternative arrangement, to send their father to a daughter who lives in California, their mother to an old ladies' home, it solves the situation for everyone except Lucy and Barkley. They meet in New York, spend their last evening together on a mild spree and then, in a scene marked by its skilful reticence, say good-by at the train. Good shot: Lucy and Barkley accepting an invitation to try out a new car by a salesman who suspects that their modest clothes and quiet bearing are the insignia of wealth.