What is the Magnet in Choosing Your 'Show'?

Manawatu Times, Volume LVI, Issue 7106, 15 March 1933, Page 5

What is the Magnet in Choosing Your 'Show'?

Wo are told there are only threo story themes in tho world, with a matter of eight different treatments per theme, so that a total of twenty-four ideas covers the whole universe’s library of drama, romanco and comedy, remarks a writer in an English paper. In view of this, how on earth do the picture-makers at Elstreo, Berlin and Hollywood manage to provide a weekly variety of fare for all tho cinemas throughout the civilised globe? Each country has its own particular and indelible method, which stamps the picture with its place of origin as plainly as the old “D.R.G.M.” once marked the German toy, and since film talkie material has been wrung, shorn, and slaughtered by all and sundry, until the very inkwells are as dry as Chicago’s coffers, each country has eoiuo to rely in a particular point of appeal to hide the w r cak story values. 1 Up to now, British producers have played safe in using well-established stage plays, tho titles of which are already in tho public eye. Early on, tho pictures wore nothing more than photographed theatre acts which cinematically were very poor stuff, their success being ontircly duo to tho previous foot.light try-outs and the relative publicity. It is not an. original criticism I make, in deploring tho lack of B'ritish film actresses. The studios are perfectly awaro of this, hence the majority of British pictures in which the feminine element is a very minor content. Our | studios, therefore, depend mostly on fairly modorato situations with four or five good, consistent characters, and proceed to make films with less attention to stellar appeal. Drama and Comedy. For every drama, at least threo comedies are produced, mostly vehicles for well-known stage favourites, although Jack Buchanan, Tom Walls, and Jack Hulbcrt will always find a market. We are constantly hearing of embryo actresses being "discovered” arid schooled for stardom, but either discernment is lacking or the studios are using the wrong treatment, since wo hear no moro about them. If the audiences won’t raise our actresses to stardom, let the producers take a leaf from Hollywood and make one or two themselves, regardless of cost in dressing, mounting, and publicity. It has paid tho Americans. It should pay the British. As it is, mado-in-England films rely mostly on dialogue and characterisations. America’s strong plank in the talkie field is undoubtedly the value of the star’s personality. Names to Hollywood whether they bo tho cast, the director or the author, mean more in dollars than anything else.

There are two kinds of stars —the natural and tho manufactured. The natural types, such as Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Constance Bennett, Gary Cooper and Marie Dressier, have attained their success through popular demand. “Send us some more pictures of Crawford,” writes the cinema manager, and Mis 3 Crawford glides up the escalator in six-eight time..

Producer-made stars are those definitely nursed and succoured by snappy stories, slick direction, and excellent supporting casts. Sometimes, the care and attention bestowed on them are returned handsomely through the box office. Often, everything goes awry, for one or two bad pictures will irrevo-

Is It Star, Story or Producer ?

cablv kill tho player who Is surreptitiously forced on tho unsuspecting public. Cotton-Wool Handling. Norma Shearer's success today is entirely duo to the cotton-wool handling she received at tho beginning of her starring career. She is luckier than Nancy Carroll and Victor McLaglen, because the fans acknowledged her ability and demanded more and more of her films. Elissa Landi, Tallulah Bankhead, and Ann Harding were made stars before they ever put a foot insido an American studio, but that does not mean that the public are clamouring to see them. All three of them are suffering from a scries of indifferent pictures, which only a natural star could overcome and retain a popularity. “It. is comparatively easy,” the Studios say, "to make a picture with Garbo or Marie Dressier.” Of courso it is, because the star is for more important than the title, tho cast, or the story. Take tho caso of Warner Baxter and Edmund Lowe. The first is a natural, tho second is a nurtured star. Of the two, Lowe is probably the bettor actor, yet tho public prefer Baxter —ho is a star of their own choice. Lowo ha 3 starred in one or two pictures, but his name carries no weight with the fans. Another strong point in American films is tho author’s name. The storyteller knows very little of film writing. He publishes the “best seller,” which is grabbed by the picture-makers, and then the most amazing things happen. The rights are purchased for several thousand dollars, and the book is handed to a sixty dollars-a-week scenarist, who is called tho adaptor. Finally tho film emerges with the original title and author, but tho plot is tho scenarist’s and tho lines belong to tho studio dialogue writer. One man, especially in Hollywood, is noted for tho largo fees ho pays to well-known authors for ideas and plots, which his isccnario department could have supplied at a fraction of the cost. W. J. Locke, P. Cr. Wodehouse, and Theodore Dreislcr are three authors whose names were required moro than their talents. So much for tho American methods. The German Viewpoint. In Germany, the alpha and omega of film-making is tho director. On his shoulders falls the succss or failure of the picture, which to my mind is the fairest situation in the business today.' It was in this school that Lubitsch and von Sternberg graduated, until moro money but less liberty was offered to them from the other side of tho Atlantic.

Today the foremost German master is Pabst, the maker of "M,” the picturisation of the Dusseldorf murders. Bizarro settings, gruesome lighting effects, and mechanical properties are the embodiment of the Teutonic effort to submerge the story weaknesses. Even their comedies are treated with a'heavv Thythm. A sense of crudeness belies the subtle scheming of the art; director, but the German producer, wiser than his American counterpart, gives his highly paid specialists a free reign with attendant responsibilities. The international markets represent a vital concern to all producers. At present, only France, Germany and Bussia arc tackling this problem with any serious' ness.