Capital Celluloid 2014 - Day 152: Mon Jun 2

Applause (Mamoulian, 1929): BFI Southbank, NFT2, 6.10pm

This is screening as part of the Passport to Cinema season and is introduced by Geoff Andrew.

Chicago Reader review:
Rouben Mamoulian's 1929 classic tells the story of a chorus-line mama (the great Helen Morgan) trying to keep her daughter out of the sleazy world of burlesque. The film is always used in courses on the history of the movies to show that not all early talkies were static and leaden, and it's true that Mamoulian manages some remarkable moving-camera effects (the only other director doing things of that sort was King Vidor in Hallelujah, also in 1929). Though this is Mamoulian's earliest, it's possibly his freshest film.
Don Druker

Here (and above) is an extract.