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To U. S. cinemaudiences, Gaumont British and Alexander Korda's London Film have been Britain's sprucest salesmen. Last week Gaumont British and Alexander Korda, proving that the British cinema industry is not entirely dormant, had two films apiece ready to join the U. S. Easter cinema parade. Of the four, the two less pretentious cost $450,000 each, represented the good homespun handiwork of which the British industry is capable when it is not making quota quickies or trying to imitate Hollywood's grand manner. The others were, important because they 1) cost about $1,000,000 each, and 2) showed it in varying ways. The best two were laid in Scotland, and both involved a dog:
Storm in a Teacup (Alexander Korda) is the tidiest, canniest, best-played bit of heather comedy to come from across the sea since René Clair made The Ghost Goes West. Provost Gow of Baikie (Cecil Parker), treading pompously toward Parliament, stumbled over Mrs. Honoria Hegarty's (Sara Allgood's) dog. Patsy, and her without the money to buy him a license at all. With the twists given this incident by a bright young journalist (Rex Harrison), Patsy's grief is heard all the way to London, and the resulting sympathy nearly forces Provost Gow into the political doghouse. But his daughter Victoria (Vivien Leigh) brings everybody to heel.
Before she does. Storm in a Teacup manages to stick a few thistles on the shiny seat of British statesmanship, has its fun at the expense of bench & bar, gives a friendly, honest picture of Scottish life. That the story is as purely Scottish as haggis or brose is the doing of Playwright Tames Bridie, who a year ago took a Highland fling at Bruno Frank's German Sturm im Wasserglas, turned it into a Barrie-like play.
To the Victor (Gaumont British) is a braw and bracing cinema story directed by versatile young Robert Stevenson (Nine Days a Queen, Non-Stop New York), based on Alfred Ollivant's Bob Son of Battle. As the dour old sheepherder, whose heart is as black as his dog, Black Wull, cinemaudiences may find squat Actor Will Fyffe's burring phrases difficult to understand, his meaning never. Veteran Actor Fyffe's renown as a folksy character is one of the brightest in Britain. His career as an entertainer started in his teens, when in one night he played a gravedigger, the ghost and a strolling player in Hamlet, did a blackface curtain piece and closed the evening with a clog dance, all for four shillings, eleven pence. But his greatest acclaim has been from the music halls where his variety turns have topped bills all over the English-speaking world. Already a notable success in cinema, he will later this year make Rob Roy for Gaumont British.
Sailing Along (Gaumont British) stars England's top singer and dancer, Jessie Matthews, in a jarring $900,000 blend of inexpensive, landscapy charm and budget-eating, Hollywood-inspired bandbox décor. In the ginghamy raiment of a river barge waif, Actress Matthews' sturdy, bike-legged nimbleness seems to belie her Cockney wispyness. But squired to proper-dance frocks and slippers and a fancy stage career by Soup Magnate Roland Young. she dances dainty duos with the U. S.'s Jack Whiting, sings her way to a typical cinemusical fadeout.