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- Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
-
-
- (JANUARY 30, 1928)
-
- Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. So bland and calm was the satire of
- Author Anita Loos's famed opus, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, that,
- when translated into cinematic dialect, it seemed probable that
- only a faint echo of its hilarity would remain. Such is not the
- case. Ruth Taylor as the very arch criminal, Lorelei Lee, is so
- coy, and cogently appealing that it becomes easy to believe in
- her conquest first of the vulgar but munificent Mr. Eisman, then
- of the wan but even more wealthy Henry Spoffard. Dorothy Shaw,
- the hard-boiled bantam brunette who assists the capricious
- avarice of Lorelei, is neatly played by Alice White. It would
- have seemed not incredible had their jaunt to Paris,
- underwritten by Mr. Eisman to further the already astonishingly
- complete education of his two proteges, resulted in the complete
- rehabilitation of the French franc.
-
- Culled from the grim pages of Author Loos's comedy, the
- subtitles have the brilliance and at least part of the
- durability of a diamond bracelet, which, Lorelei Lee remarked
- in a wise-crack which has since been heard around the world,
- will last forever. Altogether, in its slyly sympathetic
- exposition of gold-digging as a fine art, the picture has
- precisely the delicious flavour of its literary model.
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-