THE MOVIEGOER

Mr. Goldwyn's hired hands have worked hard to give us a new slant on the old hick-meets-city-girl situation. This version has Gary Cooper as a musty grammarian who goes to the masses in search of live vernacular. Inevitably, he meets Barbara Stanwyck, who is a night-club warbler with Gene Krupa's orchestra. She talks a Hollywoodish brand of slang that will leave even the boys from Lindy's open-mouthed.

The direction is a masterpiece of selecting and omitting. Cooper's inevitable denunciation scene wherein the simple but honest hero tells off those who have manipulated him for Evil Ends is held down to only a few lines. Miss Stanwyck is restrained from whining and blubbering interminably, as is her wont when directors give her freere in.

One flaw, though, is the painfully self-conscious use of racy slang. Some of the players, notably Miss Stanwyck, mouth it so unfeelingly that at times it falls completely flat.

The second feature "Obliging Young Lady," is a sideshow of irrelevant wisecracks, slapstick tangents and in one scene character actors are material for a mild case of hysteria.