"Men must Fight" is a strange picture to come from Hollywood, where serious ideas are considered undeserving of screenland publicity. Such rare items as the evangelism of Cecil DeMille do not attempt to present conflicts of principle, and it is a new and brave thing to show the movie-going world the essential differences between pacifism and militarism.

It is also a forward step in the cinema world to put Miss Diana Wynyard in a leading role, and it is encouraging to see the star of "Cavaleade" already keeping the best company which the screen world can afford, Lewis Stone, whose praise has always been insufficient. Phillips Holmes, of the sharp aesthetic face, is the man in whose breast the conflict of principle works. He is the internationally-minded American youth, who returns from his chemical studies in Geneva, to find America embarking on the second "war to end war" in 1940. His birth was the result of one of these trained nurse--doomed aviator combinations so frequent in the A.E.F. during the last world war. His step-father was an officer at that time, but by 1940 this man's quiet efficiency, of the Lewis Stone variety, has made him a peace-loving Secretary of State and his name is Seward. His mother, played by Miss Wynyard, is a fine lady and a militant pacifist, as in "Cavalcade."

Everything is going smoothly for the pacifists, especially for Secretary Seward, when the action begins. Some one has assassinated someone and "we are on the verge of a war." "The New Peace Pact is off" and the drums beat. Secretary Seward sees his duty before him, as agent of the people, and persuades himself into a change of heart. Mrs. Seward is intractable, and like Lysistrata, she takes council with the women, who decide not to give the country any more men. She goes from lecture hall to lecture hall, even though her arm is broken when an enemy aviator topples a piece of the Empire State Building on her. She is heckled and hooted, her house ransacked. Her son, her disciple, finally swells out his chest, lumps his throat a bit, hides it with a firm chin, and goes off to war in an aeroplane.

Here this excellent film ends, and so we never find out who won, America or the Best of the World. But pacifism is clearly defeated. It suffers three main disadvantages from the start. Firstly, the drama itself, laid only seven years hence, holds no comfort for the advocates of Disarmament, and the incredible pictures of a night bombardment of Manhattan from the air is portentous. Secondly, Phillips Holmes, in looks and actions, is a pacifist of the old school,". . . people used to call me yellow." And thirdly, the peace-loving masses are mostly, women, and talk incessantly of "women and children." If the cause of World peace has a strong argument today, it is to point out the phenomenon of post-war Depression, and the burden to the tax-payer of preparations, operations, reparations, and veterans legislations. This last "Men Must Fight" fail to do so.