Evening star., 1928-10-14
FLASHES
FROM THE
EY {. e. NELSON.


demned. Various learned
u individuals have stamped
them as exceedingly bad for the
morals of the youth of today. In
some cities, efforts have been to
prevent the showing of certain
underworld photoplayS, and in
ether communities some of the
pictures have been cut until they
were hardly recognizable. In spite
CT al this, there has been a vogue
for crime pictures; it has drawn
long lines to the box Office win
COWS, and the patrons often favor
such stories.
This introduction is a round
about way of leading to an inter
esting angle of the present Situa-
tion, for, in Lancaster, Pa, the
iother evening, Carl E. Milliken,
former governor of Maine, told the
Rotary Club that the "so-called
crime picture produced by the
organized group of the motion pic
ture industry is, by design and
effect, a positive deterrent to
crime"
Mr.. Milliken, who, by the way,
Is now the secretary of the Motion
Picture Producers & Distributors
OF America, Inc, goes on to say:
THE motion picture is the first
great medium of expression to be-
come fully alive to its attitude
forming power and to seek delib-
erately to point that power to the
right ends. The real test of the
picture is not whether it refers to
crime, but what Mary and John,
your daughter and your son, say
to each other on the way home.
Impulse, direction, not subject, is
the criterion.
Just as in The Big Parade a
war picture, is possibly the great
est, preachment for peace in our
time, SO every energy of the in
duStry is bent to point the lesson
that it does not pay whenever
crime is used as a major or minor
theme. We had an earnest letter
from an inmate of a penitentiary
begging us for more pictures like
Underworld and calling it this
finest screen sermon against
wrong-doing in the prisoners ex-
perience. In this connection, I
cannot refrain from mentioning
that Chicago has long had the
StricteSt censorship Of motion pic
tures of any city in the country.
''If the Ballad of Reading Coal
makes a reader want to spend his
time with no light except that
little patch of blue that prisoners
call the sky then motion pictures
should never mention crime again.
Ten Nights in a Bar Room is the
greatest sermon against drink ever
written.
More and more, church, civic
and educational groups are CO.
operating to help guide pictures
toward the best and lend the
weight of their approval in posi-
tive fashion to films that achieve
real community value. And out
of 300 pictures reviewed by the
Hays organization during the first
six months of 1923, only 20 used
Crime as a theme"
! X x X 4
TOR schemes that are strange
= and ways that draw attention,
The burleSque people are giving
the photoplay houses a real run
for their money. A local burleSque
'theater hands out a personal
IcriticiSm Slip" and the customer
can fill it out with his own idea
lof a show. For instance, under
the heading, THE show is"
there is space for the patron to
eheck the words: Fair, good, bad
Fand excellent" Regarding the
chorus, one may put check mark
at either of the words: "Attrac-
tive, repellent, homely, fascinat-
ing and handsome. The scenery
can be either artistic, crude or
an eyeSore." The songs are either
"sloppy, silly, sentimental, clever
or catchy" And the patrons
mood is supposed to be checked.
He can be either "grouchy, Satiri-
cal, antagoniStic or friendly"
Also, the theater has put in bal
lot boxes for the voteleSS Wash
ingtonians. Upon entering the
theater, the patron is handed a
ballot, with a wide range of COM
ment printed thereon. But the
ballots have nothing to do with
the presidential race; the votes
Econcern the value Of burleSque
productions.
MUCH has been written about
~" that Erich Won Stroheim pic
kure, "The Wedding March," which
was a Washington attraction dur
ing the past week, but there is al
ways more to write about. Comes
word that the author director
actor, who is responsible for the
drama, did not intend that the
story should end as it does. In
the so reels which Won Stroheim
prepared and cut from a hundred
or more, the tale was altogether
different.
AS the picture now stands, the
final fade-out shows Nicki and his
bride leaving the cathedral in a
carriage after their wedding. The
bride asks a question or two, the
bridegroom answers, and all is
'over. In the real picture, as Won
Stroheim planned it and "shot" it,
the World War comes along after
the wedding and the young Aus
trian officer leaves his bride
l(played by ZaSu Pitts and starts
the march through Belgium. Then,
a number of things happen during
the war years. The bride, an
Iheiress daughter of the corn
plaster king of Vienna, kills her.
self. Nicki is seriously injured; he
becomes a cripple, and when he
returns to Vienna after the war
he finds the girl of his heart,
Mitzi (played by Faye Wray) and
narrieS her