The Man and the Moment

THE MAN AND THE MOMENT is a part-talkie silent film starring Billie Dove as a wayward pilot and Rod La Rocque as a hapless millionaire. She crashes into his speed boat in the middle of a bizarre "polo" match at sea and also crashes the plans of greedy Gwen Lee regarding La Rocque. Decent little comedy once on the lost list. This has been restored and reassembled using a silent version and matching it up with Vitaphone disks. The problem is in the talking sequences which were cut down for the silent version, so the people at Warner inserted intertitles during the talking sequences to "sync" the film. Works pretty well (although I spotted a few typos). As bizarre as the polo scene is (sound effects) there's an even more outrageous scene in a nightclub that features a giant water tank filled with swimming women. It doesn't look quite right either in proportion or speed (compared to the dancers) but creates a dazzling effect, especially once Billie Dove jumps in and swims around. Dove is very good and so is Gwen Lee as the blonde shark. I never liked La Rocque's speaking voice in early talkies and he sounds prissy here as well. Still nice to see another lost film restored and available!