Incredible as it may seem, flaming youth still flames in the movies. It has flared up most recently in "We Moderns" at the Metropolitan, a picture based, it is said, on Israel Zangwill's play about the younger generation in England. In this film Colleen Moore, the original flaming youth girl, sets out to make the flapper look old-fashioned and outdo all her previous feats in one glorious burst of flamboyant adolescence.

As anyone might judge beforehand, the result is bad. Just how bad no one would ever guess without actually seeing it.

"We Moderns" is the epitome of almost everything a movie should not be. Its theme has been sterile ever since it first appeared half a decade ago. Its characters seem to have stepped right out of the pigeonholes on the director's desk. And the direction itself, besides being plainly ignorant of the newer arts of deftness and subtlety in the cinema, is not even true to the good old thriller tradition which after all did produce some good entertainment.

The big scene in "We Moderns" comes when a crowd of youthful revellers crashes down on London roofs in a blazing dirigible. For some reason, it is about as exciting as shaking hands with a rubber glove full of wet mud in a school boy initiation.

Colleen Moore found herself catapulted into fame some years ago on the strength of a pert little face and a spontaneity of manner which exactly typified flapperdom. Now that the flapper has gone, it would seem that Colleen's day is done. We understand that she is married now. She certainly acts like it in "We Moderns".

The film is full of wise-cracking subtitles. Such as the one by the heroine's father, a dignified and venerable nobleman:

"That's what I've always said: Spank 'em and raise blisters, or leave 'em alone and raise Bolsheviks!"

And the heroine's: "Oh goodie; now we can go to Bagdad and see all the Bagdaddies!"

Etc., etc.