RETURN TO SPECTACLE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21254, 6 August 1932, Page 11 (Supplement)

RETURN TO SPECTACLE

INDICATIONS OF TENDENCY SETTINGS NOT ALL-IMPORTANT Is a return to the " super spectacle " type of film going to be the next phase of the talkies ? Most of the leading producers are now preparing massive productions, crammed with crowd players and spectacular sets, which recall the days when a " super " was rated by the number of crowd players employed and the amount of material consumed in the construction of elaborate backgrounds. Fox are getting ready to throw all their resources into Noel Coward's " Cavalcade." Paramount are preparing an American National spectacle called " The Bong of the Eagle, and Universal, by way of retaliation, are contemplating the production of " The Road Back," Remarque's sequel to "All Quiet," on a vast scale. Whether all the " mammoth " pictures planned will actually reach the screen is a matter for conjecture. If all we hear about Hollywood's financial condition is true, she ought to be cutting down costs instead of embarking on expensive superfilms. But there appears to be a definite tendency toward the spectacular, mainly because the ordinary or " programme " picture is no longer a steady source of profit. Are tho producers right in assuming that spectacle is the answer to their prayers ? Have they considered the fact that the majority of tho really outstanding talkies so far shown are great in treatment and. theme rather than in acting ? Pictures such as " Melody of Life " and " Tho Man I Killed," or " The Broken Lullaby" do not owe their success to lavish backgrounds, but to the realism and humanity with which they tell their stories. "All Quiet,on the Western Front," the most spectacular of the dramatic talkies, was certainly on a par with the big silent films in scope and size, but its more intimalo moments—the shell-hole scene and the young soldier's death in hospital, for example—were more gripping than all its battlefield horrors.