The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-05-28
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
FREDERIC j. HAsKIN, Director,
Washington, d. G.
THE FOREIGN FILM INVASION.

Z
industry Those who. only a few
months ago. stood solidly united in
the fight against censorship, now are
split into two bitter and belligerenr
factions by a new issue-the impor-
tation of foreign films.
Since the successful Introduction of
the German film, Passion" not long
ago. dozens of German film produc-
lions have been received in this coun-
try, forty-six recently arriving in one
week. And they are still coming in,
with no end of them in sight. En-
couraged by the German success.
moreover, the French are now making
films with the American market in
view, and the Italians, who are ia
nous for the artistic quality of their
pictures, are said to be speeding US
sample products.
This flood of importations Is re-
garded with the most serious mis-
givings by actors, directors and others
employed in our own moving picture
industry, who realize that it means
curtailment of production in this
country. They know that for every
foreign film bought by an American
producer, he will make one less over
here and employ correspondingly
fewer people. The picture people
have already lived thru an exceedingly
lean year Willis Tic UlS
companies were getting rid of their
surplus stock Now they face an
even greater crisis if the influx OF
foreign films keeps up.
Thus, the war cry is being sounded
thruout the industry and the various
organizations of actors, directors, as
sistant directors, scenario writers and
camera men are sharpening their
weapons for a stiff fight against the
foreign films. Leading the rebellion
is the Actors Equity Association,
which has enlisted the aid of the
American Legion and is preparing to-
take the matter up with congress,
with a view to securing a protective
tariff.
The opposition has become so in
tense that when THE Cabinet of DR..
Caligari," (the new German futuristic
film which has created such a furore)
was exhibited in Los Angeles a few
weeks ago, it was boycotted. Pro-
tests were first lodged by the Ameri-
can Legion, the Motion Picture Di-
rectors' Association, the International
Alliance of Theatrical Stage EN-
ployees and Moving Picture Operators.
When the theater management paid
no attention to the. protests, pickets
from these organizations, including
wounded veterans of the war, were
stationed outside the theater with
banners admonishing the public not
to patroniZe it.
Boycotting a Film.
The demonstration, which lasted
from the opening time on Sunday I'M
til $3.50 at night, was unquestionably
successful Up until o'clock about
rs persons entered the theater, while
less than that number attended the
evening show. Thousands were at
tracted to the neighbor5hood.
but they merely stood on the sidewalk
and viewed the proceedings. When
a patron emerged from the theater
he was jeered at, but there was 10
violence of any kind. AT o'clock,
the theater management announced
that another picture had been sub
stituted for the German film.
The great menace of the foreign
| films from the American, picture peo-
pies standpoint is their remarkably
| low cost. Owing to the difference in
| American and European exchange
rates, they can> be bought for a mere
song and distributed at a tremendous
profit Passion" for instance, which
| is said to have been bought for a pit
| lance, has already brought its Ameri-
can distributors over million dollars.
Some of the films, deliberately staged
and containing massive scenes show
| ing 10000 people in action, are sold
/ for $4,000 apiece.
| Furthermore, the new foreign films
are tremendously popular. Except in
| the Los Angeles instance where the
| theater was picketed, they have drawn
unprecedented crowds, and hence are
much in demand by moving picture
| exhibitors. Not only has the public
| forgotten its supposed distaste for Gus
tune plays, and given the German
pictures its enthusiastic endorsement,
but American critics have given them
a royal welcome. Passion" was the
first picture since Griffith's 1.-The Birth
of a Nation which made the movie
critics drop their stereotyped phrases
and launch forth into original and i'm
passioned eloquence. Columns OF
praise were heaped upon the Germans
Polish star, Pola Negri, and the frank
liy German dictator, Lubitsch, all in
terspersed with unwelcome COMPARE
sons of the German film and the typi-
cal American production.
| The next German film, Deception,
has earned an almost equally favor
able reception. Here is a sample OF
the sort of thing which the American
movie ranks are finding SO depressing:
Deception" by an odd paradox, is
a German picture about English his,
tory. 1t tells the story of Anne
Boleyn, the second charmer in the
sextet of wives of King Henry VIII
Both as an historical and as a hu-
man document, it is magnified
Lubitsch (the directory brings history
to life and turns dead and gone fig
ures into human beings. It is an ole
historical dramas and that no one will
go to see costume plays. But ''De'
ception" has proved that the public
is ten times more Interested in ar
historical drama than they are In the
average brand of treacle handed out
by directors who have neither educa.
: tional background nor imagination
The picture defies another rule o.
routine production: it ends tragically
The only quarrel those who saw Il
J had with the picture was that it ended
too soon. Most of them would have
been happy if Lubitsch had gone or
and filmed the rest of English history
German Propaganda Again.
It was Immediately after this tina
the old wartime cries of German
: propaganda" began to be circulated
on Broadway. 1t was pointed on
that Deception was really nothing
more than a scandalous episode il
English history; that the German