New Pictures

White Gold (Jetta Goudal). Old Carson (George Nichols) owns a sheep ranch, these six months blistered by a relentless sun. With his son, Alec (Kenneth Thomson), he herds his woolly treasure on scorched hills. Into their baked monotony the son brings his bride, a young dancing girl of quick spirit (Jetta Goudal). The maddening sun drives them all to exasperation, so that when a tramp herder (George Bancroft), driven by hunger for the bride, forces his way into the room Alec left in a huff, tragedy stalks along with him. The film comes as near to genuine tragedy as anything the season has witnessed. For that reason, it may prove unpopular.

The Triumph of the Rat. U. S. cinema producers--content for nine-tenths of the year with dispensing sentimental froth and such subtitles as: "Morning came, but the heart of the beautiful lady was dark with despair"--may well take another look at Europe, the land of Variety, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, The Rat and its sequel, The Triumph of the Rat. This last named film (an English production) is "shot" from shrewd angles; contains Paris den and ballroom scenes; has a lean, dark hero (Ivor Novello) who can make love like a gentleman and gnaw a bone dramatically. The lady of the film is Isabel Jeans, blond as honey. The plot gyrates masterfully. Few spines will fail to gyrate when exposed to it. The Notorious Lady (Lewis Stone, Barbara Bedford). Her ill fame was gained in court, where she painted herself a scarlet woman in order to save her husband arraigned on a murder charge. As usual, the husband fails to understand such exquisite betrayal. He dons a romantic white helmet, sets out for South Africa, becomes involved with diamonds, Negroes, wild beasts. Believing him dead, his wife also visits South Africa. When such melodramas are presented in college towns, the boys throw peanuts at the screen.

Matinee Ladies (May McAvoy, Malcolm McGregor). Cradle-snatchers again. A young man, nowadays, seems to pay as inevitably as the harassed heroines of a decade ago. At a roadhouse, the hero, law-student, jigs with women too old to trade in their own personality. But he loves the cigaret girl. The villain lures her to a boathouse, where, once in his fell clutches, who can say what fearsome fate is in store? Just when the audience might, if it cared, drop out of its seats because of the horrible suspense, the hero romps along with his right uppercut in good working order.

Frisco Sally Levy (Sally O'Neil, Roy D'Arcy). The business of an Irish wife's cooking gefuellte fish for her Jewish spouse, introducing Police Officer Patrick Sweeney to the Lapidowitz family, etc., will never cease, agree pessimists.

The Sea Tiger (Milton Sills). On a sea-swept island off the coast of Spain, lives Justin Ramos (Milton Sills) captain of a fishing vessel, hardfisted, passionate, intent upon the affections of Amy (Mary Astor). To win her, he batters many men into hasty submission, generally employing for this purpose a righthanded, crunching, demoralizing and incapacitating haymaker, after the manner of Milton Sills since the time when the memory of man runneth not to the contrary. Finally, he chucks his ladylove under the chin, drags her to church and enters holy matrimony.

Afraid To Love (Florence Vidor, Clive Brook, Norman Trevor). Sir Reginald (Clive Brook), by the terms of a will, must marry within 48 hours, lest the family fortune go to Wapping Aquarium. Persuaded by Helen De Semiano (Jocelyn Lee), siren, who would wed him if she were divorced and means to as soon as she is, he goes to the altar with an unattractive woman (Florence Vidor) soon to be discarded, thus baffles the fishkeepers, But his pawn of marital finance evolves into a beautiful queen, so Sir Reginald stays married, the siren finds her scheme wrecked, the audience is amused at regular intervals.