PICTURE PROPHECIES

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 31 December 1927, Page 6

PICTURE PROPHECIES

THE POWER OF THE FILM.

“The Americans have been lucky over this film business. Just when they needed money to expand it, along came the war, and everyone soon had money to burn. In the beginning American financiers were no more anxious than European banks are today to lend the film man money. Enormous sums were lost, and ruin stared all pioneers in the face before the producer began to profit from experience. Gradually the financiers saw there was more in the film than a toy, and the receipts for munitions sold to Europe began to go into celluloid and and the bricks and mortar of the newfangled super-cinema.”

This is an extract from “Filins: Facts and Forecasts” (Geoffrey Bles), by L’Estrange Fawcett. The author, who is the film critic of the “(London Morning Post,” recently visited the United States in general and Hollywood in particular, in order to gain first-hand information about the position and prospects of the American film industry. His book sets forth the results ‘of his investigations, but its scope is wider still. Its object is “neither to praise nor blame the film but to examine some aspects of it, indicating its present weakness and strength, and describing some of its business and technical processes. The book hopes to expose some fallacies, explode some theories and propound others, and study the film critically and sympathetically. ” Mr. Fawcett makes it clear that more than financial difficulties are at the back of the Bri tish failure to retain control of the film industry. In the first place, picture production in England has been, to some extent, haphazard and unorganised, never until now has it attracted big finance. Then it has had to contend with an “inferiority complex.” The cinema existed, so to speak, on sufferance, as a sort of vulgar poor relation of the spoken drama. Xno intellectual part of the nation either despised or ignored it. None had the imagination to envisage its almost limitless'possibilities of development. In America the “highbrow” clement is a negligible fraction of the population. “Art and litcature are liable to bo treated as occupations for the rich dilettante.” Thus the development of the American film was a by-product. The Jews saw an opportunity of making “big money”; many rival combinations sprang up, and competition did the rest.

Another advantage for the film business possessed by the United States is its cosmopolitan population which forced producers to seek for “the universal appeal” instead of developing an individual style, and it was, therefore, easier to dispose of these films throughout tbe world. The author does not imply that the American system produces perfection. Educated people are still driven from the cinema by idiotic film-themes and illiterate titling.

Though the author deals with production rather than personalities there are some attractive pictures of Charlie Chaplin in hi s studio having afternoon tea after the English fashion, and of Harold Lloyd, “proud of his mixed English, Scotch and Welsh descent, and with none of that aggressiveness you meet with on many studio stages.” Another interesting side-issue is the question of “fan-letters” which supply the personal touch between players and public. “Few people in England can be aware what a film star’s “fanmail” means to him and her. Every star wants to let it be known that he or she is receiving the most letters in the studio. According to Variety (April, 1927), Miss Colleen Moore for some time previous to that date had been receiving 15,000 letters and sending out 12,000 photographs a month. . . “Variety calculates that players such as, John Barrymore, Ronald Colman and Tom Mix spend anything from £5 to £SO a week in sending out letters and autographed photographs to keep their “fans” happy.

One chapter deals with foreign film production, particularly German (as in “Faust,” “Vaudeville” and “Metropolis’-’), Swedish—the Swedes, Mr. Fewcctt considers, were the pioneers of the artistic film—and Russian. The Soviet has produced a remarkable and terrible picture, ‘.‘Potemkin,’’ which is the first instalment of a series with the definite aim of spreading their revolutionary propaganda. . ... On the whole the author is optimistic about the future of the film. There are thousands of awful films, he admits, but then there arc thousands of awful plays. “What we should judge the film by is its aspirations and the best examples of its art.” Finally, ‘ ‘ there is here a terrific power, a live force, like electricity. Bridle it, handle it, use it, enjoy it, whatever you like, but for goodness sake don’t*disregard it. Just think of 250,000,000 people in the world going to the ‘movies’ every week of thenlives. How can you alter the process by jabbering about dramatic unities and‘standards? You must accept the state of affairs as a natural development. . . The film is truly representative of modern life. . • We have little idea what it holds in store for us. Don’t let us miss the chance of finding out. ‘jCarpe diem.’ ”