The mirror., 1923-03-01


lowing, the professional actors looked
askance at this new venture. 1t was
often, considered an insult to be offered
work before the camera. But enough of
them did steal away at these surreptitious
beckonings so that the necessities of the
young industry were supplied. ]. Barney
Sherry, who first apeared in "Raffles" for
Vitagraph in 1904, is prehaps the only
veteran who has survived the changes of
the ensuing years and come down to us
as a popular player intact And only
within the present year has that famous
parsonage, David Belasco in contracting
with Warner Bros. for the screen produc-
ton with his personal assistance of three of
his plays, "The Gold Diggers," "Deburau,"
and "Daddies," descended into the arena
The beginning of any form of express
sion is necessarily crude, and only by its
aloofness from the rabblement can it avoid
becoming brummagemous. But when an
art depends for its existence upon the
multitude it must first look to their fetish
isms rather than its own ideals Conse-
quenty the early plots employed were of
the chase, with enough motif involved to
give an illusion of realism. And from the
spectacle of men and dogs in pursuit of
murderer, or of the fire department speed
ing to the rescue of the trapped child it
was a logical sequence that melodrama
should be borrowed from the stage and
made more startling. Passion, reprisal,
acquisitiveness, hate, circumstance, love-,
sentiment, faith, all of the moral percep-
tions were dragged in on the slightest
provication at breakneck speed. Exag-
geration disguised old plots and when
that failed trickery was used. For the
mechanics, the science, of the motion pic
ture far outstepped the fundamental art
itself The finished reels of film were
bought and sold and contracted for in
advance, halls and playhouses were
turned over to the exclusive exhibition of
pictures, capital was interested, the ven
ture became an industry. And if the few
men who held the advancement of the
art above scheduled production were
handicapped, the fault lay in the nature
of the motion pictures and not outside of
them. Actors were no longer able to
withstand the pressure of high salaries
and publicity tempting them. The per-
sonnel of a single company grew to enor-
nous proportions, the detail of single
picture became extravagant. BY 1914 in
dustry had so absorbed the art that fur
ther refnements of mechanism were ex-
pected and accepted as matter of course.
Since then the spectacle play has become
more and more a feature of the weekly
program. Architectural devices have been
improved to seeming perfection, es-
pecially in the imported German specta
Gle films. Responses to the human eye
have been studied and attempts have been
made to apply the results observed. Space
in relation to crowds, and movement in
relation to crowds and to space, have been
experimental with until some unity of
action with the whole has been reached.
But the American directors appear to
have ignored the instruction offered by
these importations. From Grffith's "The
Birth of Nation" to Fairbanks "Robbin
Hood" sense of tempo is lacking. The
climax is played with no variation of
pace. Emotional intensity projected by
contrast to pace rather than by mere in