The Wanganui Chronicle SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1938. THE ART OF THE SCREEN

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 82, Issue 305, 24 December 1938, Page 6

The Wanganui Chronicle SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24, 1938. THE ART OF THE SCREEN

"THE film screen is the place for the production of. the most modern of the arts. Its importance is not to be exaggerated. Its present, paucity of quality cannot be too deeply deplored. What is the reason for the long run of poor dims which have been shown on the screens of the cinema theatres of the world? There is no fundamental reason, there is no single answer to the question of what is wrong with the films. There are those who complain that the art of the scieen is too commercialised to be successful as an ai t. Such a complaint is nonsensical, for all art, to be successful, must be commercialised. Where is the artist who will go on with his art when it makes him the poorer? An artist, like everyone else, has to live, and live by his art. When he attempts to do this he commercialises his talent. The heartening thing about the screen is that it has been commercialised in such a thoroughgoing manner. The exhibitors asks for box-office attractions, that is to say, films which draw the crowds. Why should they not? There is every reason, from the public standpoint, why they should seek to draw the crowd. When a film attiacts the public it is providing the public with the entertainment which it is asking for. The question which the exhibitor is continually asking is: What does the public really want? Does it want good films, that is those with a foundation of serious ideas ’ Docs it want good humour, that is, films with really funny situations? Docs it want spectacular films, that is, those which appeal to the mind by their pageantry? Does it want adventure films, that is films iii which are staged unusual situations involving danger to the performers, so that the audience, living sheltered lives, can experience vicarious thrills? Does it want mere pabulum? The exhibitor knows that the public wants all of these films, only in appropriate doses with changes of diet. But finding out where the public will next jump to is beyond the wit of man’s devising. In the end the public settles the demand side of the film industry, but only after the films have been made which leaves all of the risk to the producer. The producer never produces to order, but always on a guess as to what will be successful. The current paucity of films must, in some measure at least, be blamed on the public. They do not support the good films. Such films as “Louis Pasteur.” which film was good history, dramatic in the extreme, and strongly presented, should have resulted in crowded houses, but unfortunately it did not do so, thereby discouraging the production of such finis. The production of “Romeo and Juliet,” with Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer in the main parts, was a splendid piece of work from every standpoint, but it did not come up to reasonable expectations. Thefe have been some excellent musical film plays in recent years, the most successful being “Naughty Marietta, and it deserved all of the success which attended its presentation. These successes, however, have seldom been repeated. Mhy so? Because, says Leslie Howard, Hollywood is lacking in ideas and in money. That is a very sad state of affairs indeed, for it takes a lot of money to produce a modern play, and Hollywood should not be begrudged the money which it collects from the public. On the whole, the public gets a very good deal. But the lack of ideas is serious, and it is also obvious. The paucity of the films of to-day seems to be the result of the manner in which films are produced. The ideas of the artist get lost, a number of people playing up to the management of the company producing- the film, make a hotchpotch of the. whole artistic conception and serve it up to the public a thing of shreds and tatters. This is the judgment of Leslie Howard and the recent exhibitions seem to bear out his opinion.