New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1921-09-18
What's Wrong With Movies?
Censorship, Says De Mile

Contrary to the widely circulated
reports, the motion picture industry is
not on the verge of ruin and dissolu-
ton. Rather is it going through
period Of healthy REIMBURSEMENT that is
destined to ne the salvation rather than
the ruin of the industry"
Thus spoke Cecil B. De Mile, di
RECTOR general Of Paramount. pictures,
when asked how the fourth American
industry was making out.
"The motion picture industry may be
likened to a young man who inherited
untold wealth and proceeded to grow
soft and fat in wasteful extravaganza"
Mr. De Mile pointed out. Suddenly it
became necessary for the young man
to rid himself OF his unhealthy fat and
curb his expenditures-and do it
quickly.
THE young man succeeded in his eff
forts. But all of. his friends and &C
qualntances, remembering his former
rotundity and prodigality, when they
saw him after his reduction promptly
said, why, how thin you arel'
He is not thin; he is merely normal.
The suddenness of his return to normal
may have left him a little weak, but
it Is healthy weakness, far less dam
gerous than his previous condition.
Condition Better
Than Before the War
"The motion picture industry is in
far better shape to-day than it was in
1914 That was the beginning of its
period Of wasteful extravagance.
brought about by the removal of alien
competition because of the war. Pro-
ducers We'd with one another in the ex
penditure Of money on spectacular and
lavishly staged productions.
THAT abnormal condition has oona
for all time. In it's place has come
normal, healthy condition that is in
fnitely preferable.
There has been a tendency in the
past to regard the motion picture in
dustry as bonanza means of PRO-
ducing untold wealth overnight. This
IS not the case. The motion picture in
Gustry is on basis with the steel or
the oil industry. And we are not as
hard hit by this reimbursement period
as many of our contemporaries in the
industrial field.
'The motion picture industry will
never be killed from within. In other
words, there is no danger of collapse
induced by the industry itself. The
popularity of the motion picture with
the public is a sufficient guaranty of
its continued prosperity.
But there is a very real menace
from without, and that menace is CEN
sorship. 1t can throttle the very life
of the motion picture industry, and it
Inevitably will DO just that if it be-
ccmes generally tablished
How Censorship
VIII Operate
Censorship may be likened to the
narrow part Of an hourglass. No OBJ
ject larger than the smallest point in
the middle of the glass can pass from
one lobe to the other. One lobe rep
resents the producers, who are creating
artistic pictures for the consumption
of the other lobe--the public If the
channel connecting the producer and
the public is CONSTRUCTED. it will be-
come impossible for the producer to
reach the public, and the motion pic
ture-the public's greatest favorite-
will be strangled to death.
II know that partisans Of censorship
argue that they will not resort to
strangulation; that it is the mission of
censorship to weed out Objectionable
material, to protect the morals Of the
young and to insure clean entertain |
ment for the public.
But in practice this process CON-
sists of throttling the producer. Any /
idea that is too big for the minds of the /
censors will be cast out as unfit for the
public. The idea in point may be
great and worthy one, but if 1t is too
big for the neck of the hourglass it
will never reach the public.
IF Thomas Edison had been forced !
to submit all Of his inventive ideas to |