IRELAND' AND THE FILMS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 24 February 1925, Page 4

IRELAND' AND THE FILMS

The anti-ttobacco agitation in the United States, which has been pushing into the forefront of the cable news lately, will, strike most people as a forlorn hope with no great weight of reason behind it. Of much more importance, and of really vital concern to the moral well-being of the race, is tin? crusade which, the Irish Free State may have opened, against- the objectionable type of motion picture film -o finely produced in the home country cr those who are tilting against the weed. Nothing further may come of it, but to-day’s cables suggest that the Free Slate Board of Censors has taken a stand which no .similar body has taken hitherto, and it- is possible that the effects may be far-reaching. Irelam! is not the only country which would prefer not to have pictures- ex hibiting the vices of the underworld in great cities;; but it may be that she liS the first country to say en officially, 'the attitude, taken up by the- London film houses: that they are in the hands of the American producers, and musi pass on what they receive, is just about played out. If other countries had shown the courage of the Free State Board of Censors, and laid it down quite definitely that they would not have films of a certain class, the American producer would have soon come to -heel. It- may be argued that the bulk of the people want what is being turned out from the studios of California ; but we fancy that there I aic few persons in this country who ! would object to a little improvement in the tone of some programmes: that although we have our own censor, to whom the parents" or ■ New’ Zealand possibly owe more than they can tell on account of whiat does not appear on our screens. But far better that the .objectionable- films should never be produced; and it should tie possible to stay the rate- of their production if the authorities in other lands will come out now in .support of Europe’s youngest nation.