FILMS AND POSTERS

Southland Times, Issue 19895, 14 June 1926, Page 11

FILMS AND POSTERS

SOME OBJECTIONABLE FEATURES ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT. ‘I think that the public get just the kind of cinema films they ask for, and •that the private judgment of the exhibitor has little to do with it,” said the Rev. Stanley Morrison, when the Council of Christian Congregations discussed the question of modern amusements at Auckland. “A draper may be a decent man, and he may not like to see a giddy Pollyanna of 69 gadding about in skirts above her knees, but he sells them to her, and it is just the same with the films.” He thought there was too much talk and too little done in connection with objectionable films. No less than 600,000 people went to the pictures every week in New Zealand, it was estimated. The Fuller-Hayward circuit accommodated no less than 200,000 every week. It was surely time»that a better picture movement be started in New Zealand. A small committee of reviewers could be set up, and these reviewers could make a point of being present when films were being run through for the benefit of the theatre orchestras. If the reviewers thought a film was good they could issue a certificate, which would be published. That had been done in America, and it had had a tremendous influence for good. Such endorsement would carry weight with the people, and with the exhibitors. The discussion on modern amusements was opened by the Rev. J. Pattison, who referred to three subjects in particular — harmful and immoral literature, tainted moral pictures and dancing. Speaking of bad books, Mr Pattison said the council would be glad to know that the booksellers had agreed not to order books of known evil character. The speaker also referred to film posters, some of which were often worse than the films they advertised. Though dancing of itself was not evil, some of its associations were far 1 from healthy. Even the secular Press sometimes sounded a warning concerning the evils associated with the dance. His experience as a pastor was that when dancing got a hold on young people they became dead to spiritual things. “The time is not only ripe for action with regard to film posters—it is rotten ripe,” said the Rev. J. J. North. It was time for people of “ginger and goodwill” to bring the whole matter before the new Minister of Education, a man of puritan tendencies, while the Prime Minister—a man who had taken a commendable stand against art unions—should also be approached, with a view to cleaning up this public mess. There was no censorship of the posters, which were often a direct and lurid incentive to vice, and constituted a nuisance of the first magnitude. The trouble with the eternal triangle cinema plots was that they depicted a form of life which was not lived and never would be lived by nine-tenths of the people, said the Rev. G. H. Hunt. He thought the churches might do a lot of good by interesting their young people in good plays of literary value, which could either be read or enacted in the church halls. The secretary, Mr H. Field, said the council would be glad to know that the City Council had promised that they would take steps to remedy anything objectionable in the way of posters displayed on hoardings under the council’s control, providing the objectionable features were pointed out. Mr Pattison said he did not think the majority of film exhibitors wanted to display objectionable posters. Very often they did not know what they were ordering when they were making up their lists of advertising material. On the suggestion of Rev. W. E. Lush the matter of taking action with regard to posters was referred to the executive of the council.