Cheaper and Better Films

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 129, 24 February 1939, Page 5

Cheaper and Better Films

Leaders In English Industry Say What They Would Do With £30,000 A CTING on the contention that British producers make a mistake in spending large anioinits on imported talent, J. Danvers Williams, a writer in the “Film Weekly,” London, asked “some of the more interesting people in British films’ what they would do with £30,000. Although, he said, a director such as Michael Powell or Carol Reed occasionally brought forth in pictures like “Edge of the World” or “Bank Holiday” for £20,000 or £30,000, cheap British pictures were unsatisfactory. Some of the greatest films had been made for less than £30,000.

T WENT to see Carol Reed, and discovered that he would make a film version of Daphne du Mauriers 111 Never Be Young Again,” lie writes. “Of course,” said Reed, “under existing conditions I should never be allowed to embark on this picture, for it has an unhappy ending. “The work of any director making pictures iu this country is conditioned absolutely by the happy ending. I am sure that this is a wrong-minded policy, and keeps many intelligent people out of the cinemas, for whatever the circumstances of a story the end is inevitably the same, boy gets girl.” Wendy Hiller was the person I went to see next. “There is only one picture that I really crave to make,” she told me, “and' that is a film-version of ‘Love ou the Dole.’ lam convinced that if this subject were bravely handled, it would become the British counterpart of ‘Street Scene’ or ‘Dead End.’ “When this play was first running in London, several film companies approached the authors for the screen rights. Most of these offers fell through because the companies in question wanted to dilute and soften the story. As the authors pointed out, unless it were filmed as it stood, the companies might just as well find new material. Diluted, ‘Love on the_ _ Dole' would lose all its power and virility. “Offers still come in from time to time, and it is to be hoped that if we stand out long enough someone will eventually contract to make an undiluted film version qf the play.” Film of Conrad Novel. When I asked Anthony Asquith what he would make if he were handed £30,000, be replied, “A film of ‘Lord Jim’.” Asquith is the man who, more than anyone else, must be credited with the success of “Pygmalion.” It was he who co-ordinated all the talent employed in the picture and turned this difficult Shavian comedy into a smooth and dynamic motion-picture. “It is a wonder to me,” said Asquith, “that this subject lias not been screened long ago. ‘Lord Jim’ is one of the finest uovels in the English language, and is particularly suited to the screen —much more so, in my opinion, than ‘Crime and Punishment’ or ‘Anna Karenina.’

“This story of a young Briton who, in a moment of emergency, ‘fails in his duty,’ then spends the rest of his life in a self-imposed penance endeavouring to salve his own conscience, is one of the most penetrating character studies in literature*. “Besides this, ‘Lord Jim’ has plenty of action, and is set against suitably

filmic backgrounds—sea, ships and Eastern ports. “What a fine sequence it would make when the officers of the Patna, thinking that she has been holed, desert their ship, leaving their cargo of Chinese pilgrims to perish. “With a handful of competent actors,” said Asquith, “I could make this picture quite cheaply, photographing most of the sea scenes inside the studio by means of process shooting.” The last director I interviewed was Michael Powell, who made “Edge of the World.” Powell is an extremely competent artist. Some years ago I saw a film, “Red Ensign,” which he had made in three weeks for about £4OOO. Though obviously cramped and cheaply made, it was remarkably stimulating. Powell is at his best with open-air subjects. His reply, when I asked him what he would do with his hypothetical £30,000, was characteristic. “I would make a film of ‘Precious Bane,’ ” he said. “This novel by Mary Webb has always fascinated me. She has such an immense grasp of the country, Shropshire, in which the story is laid, and of the psychology of the characters with whom she deals. The book vibrates with life. “I would ask Robert Donat to come into the picture on a co-operative basis and recreate the part of Kester, which he played on the stage. “This is one of his favourite characterisations, and I think that he would willingly come into the film if contracts permitted him to do so.” Apart from the people already mentioned, who are all intimately connected with the film industry, there are lots of other individuals —writers particularly —who would be pleased to lend their talents to the screen. J. B. Priestley’s Views.

Priestley for example. When I rang him up he said: “Certainly, I should be only too willing to co-operate in the production of cheap and intelligent films, especially if I were allowed to deal with subjects which I consider significant.” Then there is T. S. Eliot and W. H. Auden who wrot.e “The Ascent of F.C”; and artists like Wyndham Lewis and Stanley Spenser who could be approached to design sets and backgrounds. Such co-operation with the best contemporary brains would not only benefit the film industry: it would do the artists good as well. It would give them a definite function in life and would prevent them from producing too often books and paintings in which only scholars and the highest of highbrows are at present interested.