Film Censorship.

Press, Volume LXIX, Issue 20919, 28 July 1933, Page 10

Film Censorship.

The discussion on film censorship at the conference of the Federation of Women's Institutes yesterday produced a curious mixture of unintelligent criticism and sound sense. Though the conference passed the usual resolution urging that the censorship be more strict, it was evident that some of the delegates realised that the problem of the cinema would have to be solved on other lines. The censorship is, after all. a negative device; and while it can eliminate pornography and the worst forms of vulgarity, it cannot to any important extent alter the influence of the cinema for good or evil. "Plain vulgarity may do little "harm," says the report of a recent British enquiry into the influence of the film in national life. "It is the steady stream of third- " rate films passed for universal ex- " hibition which is the danger, with " its sentimental and sham-emo-"tional standards of value, dealing "with unreal people." Against the corrupting influence of shoddy but morally respectable films there is no remedy except a more enlightened public taste and an ability to sort out the good from the bad. Fortunately there is good reason to believe that the remedy is already at work. It may be argued, however, that the effect of films on adults is relatively unimportant and that the real problem is raised by their effect on children. But it seems that those who are most concerned for the moral welfare of children sometimes fail completely to understand how children react to films. The Chief Inspector of Schools to the London County Council, in a recent report on this subject, writes:

All the inspectors who mention it, and in this they are supported by most of the evidence of teachers, are convinced that the morally questionable element in films is ignored by children of scho - age. The, element which the adult would most deprecate to put before children does, in fact, bore them.

In any case, as one speaker pointed out yesterday, it would be a mistaken and harmful policy to compel adults to see no entertainment but what is suited to the child mind. The matter is one in which parents as well as the State have a duty; and the Federation of Women's Institutes would probably do more good by appealing to parents than by worrying at the Government. There is, however, one aspect cf the censorship which the Government ought to make clearer; and that is the functioning of the Appeal Board. If, as was stated yesterday, the Appeal Board frequently undoes the work of the censor, there are grounds for thinking that the system is unsatisfactory. It would be interesting to know what films have, in the last six months, been rejected by the censor but released by the' Appeal Board.