THE DIVINE CECIL

In the movies anything can happen. Heroes can be heroic with little or no effort: villains can lead lives unblemished by any redeeming virtues: heroines can get away with murder in fact they often do. In the movies anything can happen so Cecil B. de Mille decided to film the Bible. There were groans at the announcement that the man who wears the nattyist sport shirts in Hollywood and who has the most devoted elique of yes-men ever gathered, and that in a city where yes-men are as thick as section-men in Cambridge, intended to make a cinema version of the Testaments.

Now the picture has come to Boston. It arrives heralded by laudatory--nay, panegyrical--criticisms from New York. There appears to be a distinct impression that Mr. de Mille has generally improved the original. He has added a great many details to enhance the glory of his film. He has given it what one would expect from him--lavishness. The result is a thing of beauty and a joy forever, according to the blushing advertisements.

Perhaps Mr. de Mille has done all this and it is very likely that he has produced an interesting and in all probability and instructive entertainment. Nevertheless he has committed a heinous breach of taste, for he has more than hinted that his inspiration while making the picture was of as divine an origin as was Moses' when he received the Ten Commandments. Evidently the completed film was the work of Cecil B. de Mille in co-operation with Michel the Archangel. Whatever success the picture has, piously murmurs the gentlman, is due not so much to himself as to his celestial aid.

It is very unfortunate that the maestro should have so prefaced his latest effort. Whatever worth the picture has will suffer disparagement when compared with director's bloated ideals. They needed a Yes-Man in Heaven and God appointed C. B. de Mille.