CENSORING SOUND FILMS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20364, 19 September 1929, Page 10

CENSORING SOUND FILMS.

The discussion on sound films in the Legislative Council yesterday was chiefly significant in that it reflected opinions expressed elsewhere since the advent of this extended form of screen entertainment. One suggestion made during the debate expresses the best method of eliminating the type of accent and idiom likely to affect adversely the current speech of the country—that of encouraging something more desirable. The most definite and most important statement made came from the Leader of the Council, who. it must be assumed, made it officially. Mr. Sidey said it was not practicable to establish a censorship of sound films, for technical reasons. It has been said before, but it is doubtful whether its significance has been fully appreciated. With the silent film, censorship and expurgation are simple. An episode can be cut out entirely, and the film joined up again very easily. The continuity of the story may be affected, but the film can be run through the projecting machine as when it was complete. This is not so with the sound film. The consequences of this are important. At the outset it appears as though the country is placed at the mercy of the film manufacturers and must take what they offer without question. The same would apply to the exhibitors, many of whom would be prepared to excise objectionable episodes, irrespective of official censorship, if they could. The obvious remedy is a firmer application of the censorship. It is quite practicable to censor sound films despite technical difficulties, by forbidding their exhibition at all if they 'contain anything to which serious exception can be taken. It would be a drastic step. Possibly it would not need to be taken often. It is to be hoped it would not. If the issue arises, however, it is the course that certainly should be followed. Those responsible for the censorship should be assured of complete official and full moral support if they found it necessary to do anything of the kind, and should be instructed to do their duty no matter how powerful the interests involved. Censorship of tho silent film was not imposed without cause, and the arrival of a new type of screen entertainment should not weaken what was a very necessary public safeguard.