LOVE ON THE SCREEN.

Evening Star, Issue 26067, 3 April 1947, Page 6

LOVE ON THE SCREEN.

The Bishop of London may not have been fairly represented in the severelycondensed cabled version of an article ho has written on divorce, but the blame he attributes tO' Hollywood films for this social problem seems excessive. He is quoted as saying that most young people to-day have to judge whether they are in love from indications in films, hut it is a bleak and barren existence that he envisages when he suggests that the people of this age acquire their experience of life in such a secondhand manner. Hollywood has merited many of the jibes that it has received; it is often a most artificial life that it presents, and the glamorous life portrayed often has little relation to reality. But it is doubtful if the young film fans who live on a diet of romances on the screen ever seriously believe that they can attain to such an existence. The ingredients , that make a film are similar to those that make a drama, and although the stage used to be frowned upon as something less than respectable, it is probably not seriously considex-ed to be a menace to a happy married, life. Certainly the film stars have set fashions in shortlived marriages, but it is probable tliat

I inquiry should be made elsewhere to determine the reason for a rising rate in divorce. • . • In New Zealand, there is still considerable reluctance to break up a marriage, because of pubic opinion and because of the statutory limitations of opportunity, and anthropological experience suggests that these are factors more potent than the _ influence of Hollywood. Among primitive races where divorce is simple the rate is liighi whereas among others where marriage is expected to last for life it usually does. Such races have not yet come under the influence of the motion picture industry. It is not necessary to defend the film; it often does merit and receive sharp condemnation for its eccentricities, foibles, and excessive glamourising of life, but the public is essentially sensible, and it demands a fairly close approximation to realism. By degrees 'the motion pictures have climbed Out of swaddling clothes to become an important potential art form. It is the entertainment of the masses of the day with all that that implies, and although it has its ever-changing' fashions, like women’s clothes, it reflects rather than directs public opinion.