The New Pictures

Letter of Introduction (Universal). Presumably on the theory that the proper study of mankind is man, Hollywood long ago assumed that the proper study of the cinema is the entertainment business. Cycles in Hollywood flare and fade, but the history of the young girl who goes to Manhattan to become an actress, falls in love with a hoofer and brings down the house on opening night remains as rooted as Narcissus. To the standard ingredients of the backstage formula, Letter of Introduction adds two interesting variants: the show in which Katherine Mannering (Andrea Leeds) makes her gala debut turns out to be a calamitous flop; and the hero of the story is not her erratic young fiance but an aging, bibulous matinee idol to whose portrayal Adolphe Menjou lends the Barrymore mannerisms that have become traditional for such roles since The Royal Family. These, and Director John Stahl's watchful, vivid treatment of situations which would have been threadbare with less careful handling, give the picture exactly that air of conviction in which most such fables are deficient.

In addition to its own intense egocentricity, Hollywood's concern with show business is obviously prompted by the necessity for showing off personalities who have made a hit on other stages. Letter of Introduction thus serves as a vehicle for Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, who function simply as themselves. Ventriloquist Bergen introduces a rival to Charlie in the person of a dummy named Mortimer. Minute effigy of a country bumpkin, as hideous, crude and amiable as Charlie is tart, slick and natty, Mortimer chatters for only one sequence, after Charlie has taxed Edgar Bergen with ingratitude, but this is enough to enrage his predecessor. Says Charlie McCarthy: "This is the meanest trick you ever played on me. . . . I'll mow him down. . . ."

Love Finds Andy Hardy (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer). Fourth item in MGM's lively series on the homely, 100% American problems of the Hardy Family, Love Finds Andy Hardy rises above the standard not only of its predecessors but also of most of its producer's most expensive features. Its numerous faults--the assiduous overacting of Master Mickey Rooney, frequent instances in which bread-&-butter comedy falls butter side down, a misbegotten musical number for a climax--serve mainly to emphasize its cardinal virtue, of preserving intact the mood and flavor of ordinary life in an ordinary U. S. town. Humor of the Hardy family chronicles is based principally on the pleasures of recognition. By the time Andy (Mickey Rooney) leads the grand march at the Christmas Eve dance, the vast majority of U. S. audiences will have found in his troubles, his family and his friends the prototypes of their own. Such cinema families as the Hardys and Twentieth Century-Fox's Joneses are well on their way to developing for modern cinemaddicts the kind of cumulative box office appeal once exercised by old time serials. Good shot: Judge Hardy (Lewis Stone) settling a quarrel between his daughter and the cook, who joins the menage halfway through the picture in a manner calculated not to offend cinemaddicts who cannot afford such luxuries.

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