The art of sound pictures (1930)

WHAT PEOPLE WANT 19 brought back? It all depends on the place and the time. It is a matter of seasons, of trends, of current events. After the World War, millions wanted anything that would help them forget the filth of human combat and the criminal stupidity of war-makers. To-day, nobody needs or wants that variety of oblivion. Still there remains a widespread interest both in oblivion and in war. The causes have changed, and so, too, have the special publics. Take the shift in war interest. Men and women who were involved in the World War still smell its stench, and hate it, gore and glory alike. But we have with us to-day tens of millions of young adults who were babes and juveniles between the years 1914 and 1918. While the fighting was going on, they understood nothing and experienced little, save the flag waving and the silly propaganda of the governments. As the years passed, they listened to the veterans, to the tales of returning tourists, and to the swelling chorus of poets and novelists who cashed in on the bloody episode. They realized that they had missed something big, and they were deceived about its nature, just as we all are deceived by stories of things we have never seen face to face. So, to the rising generation of to-day, the War is a strange alluring welter of romance. It is an escape from office drudgery and school lessons, just as in 1917 the oblivion of wild parties was an escape from the nasty monotony of the trenches. Thus, as one generation ages and a next attains full stature, we find conflicting tastes and trends; and nowhere does this emerge more sharply than in the pictures, which aim to please all the large classes of humanity. The pleasant excitement which one class craves is some