The New Pictures

Love Me and the World Is Mine exhibits a bafflingly total naivete, a gay and unblushing sentimentality such as appears often in fairy tales but seldom in cinema. Agnes Thule, the youngest, hence the last, hence the ultimate Thule, falls in love with one Captain Von Vigilati, as does he with Agnes. Caught kissing, she is turned out of doors by the Thules, pere et mere. Then she goes to Vienna where she lives with a loose lady and suffers as noticeably as possible. At last, just when she is about to marry the rich man, the vigilant Vigilati puts in a timely reappearance. He must go off to war immediately, but first he has time to stand on the station platform while a camera makes it clear that the world is his.

Sensitive and excellent direction by E. A. Dupont, of Variety fame, titling in the manner of the early Griffith period, photography that wraps around Vienna a mist of adventure and half-remembered sorrow--these are the assets of Love Me and the World Is Mine. Its fault is too much facial contortion from pretty Mary Philbin and stalwart Norman Kerry, who otherwise adequately play the leads.

South Sea Love. Thus the plot begins: a young girl, ambitious for a career, says good-by to her best beloved. He will go to the South Seas, find some pearls, sell them and use the money to launch her as an actress. Soon after the departure of her inamorata, the lady herself makes big money in musical comedy. In part, she owes her success to an intent but unscrupulous young man-about-town who has stolen the money to pay for her theatrical ventures. Infuriated when she refuses to marry him, this suitor goes to the South Seas to kill his rival but remains to convince him that the lady has deceived both of them in her greed for gold. Accordingly they decoy her to the South Seas that they may punish her for so doing. Eventually, when her innocence becomes apparent, her first inamorata punches the young man-about-town, apologizes to the lady for his faint faith and prepares for a wedding.

If one can forgive its major improbabilities of plot, there is much sound cinematic realism in South Sea Love. Doubtless men do not go to the South Seas to find pearls with which to buy musical comedy careers for lovely actresses; but if they did, they might well behave as herein suggested.

The Cohens and Kellys in Paris. If there is anything inherently comic about Irish individuals and Hebrew individuals when placed in boisterous juxtaposition, this film, like its predecessor, The Cohens and Kellys, is no doubt hilarious. The previous picture not only was, in the opinion of many, a riot; it also caused violent scenes to take place in some of the theatres where it was shown. People threw tomatoes at the screen and at each other. The sequel is less likely to precipitate a war.