Business screen magazine (1946)

EXPO 70 Bu^pess Screen December. 1970 LACKED ONLY CONTENT Cliches — some old, some aging Some years ago a couple of writers produced the "in" and "out" book, wherein what was stylishly "right" and "wrong" were delineated. But then they complicated the matter by showing that some things are so far "out" they're really "in," and some so far "in" that they're really "out." Take babies for example. Expo had more than its share of them, inserted for reasons ranging from cuteness to significance. But somebody who planned the Telecommunication Pavilion unwittingly created a kind of Mack Sennett backfire. Presumably if the face of one crying baby stirs feelings of humanity, then hundreds of duplicated crying babies are hundreds of times better. Right? Wrong. It was bedlam. Also, to pick up again on visual shorthand, what is it that instantly says "youth?" Young filmmakers seem to feel that their own personal reflection, with stringy beads and guitar, says "youth." But they seem to be disregarding (or noticing, only to scoff) those greater numbers of the young who are unfashionably just studying, and preparing for the future. Expo fell into this trap, as do our own television networks, and perhaps it's because there are no easy visual symbols for quiet, earnest, lonely thought. So Expo films were full of hippies and coffeehouses and rock. And, predictably, there were bound to be mentions of the United States' "atom bomb guilt" cliche on the part of the host nation and some of its industrialists. Perhaps it is DECEMBER, 1970 By DON SWEET In the conclusion of his report on Osaka, our correspondent looks at cliches, multi-screens, words — and summarizes his observations. not a cliche to the Japanese, wihose exceedingly convenient memories enable them to overlook their thirteen year war of conquest in China and the rest of their Pacific invasion, including Pearl Harbor, while suggesting to Westerners it "might be instructive to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki." Despite my own feelings against war and killing, I had blessed Harry Truman and the bomb, for I'd already spent a year and a half in those God-forsaken Pacific islands at the Emperor Hirohito's summons, and had had excellent prospects of becoming one of the million U.S. casualties that were expected in the invasion of Japan. I admit to some bias. But the biggest cliche of all was "brotherhood." It shouldn't ever be one, but the cards seem stacked against its realization, and yet most everybody pays lip service to it, while acting to the contrary. World's Fairs being what they are, "brotherhood" was trotted out again, this time in the form of "Progress and Harmony for Mankind." There was a kind of chain reaction, for many of the pavilions (I counted sixty-seven) adopted related sub-themes. There were "Wodd of this." and of "that.'" Beauty, Love, and Hope. Enjoyinent and Enterprise Through Harmony. Beauty in Everyday Life, Man the Problem Solver, and, among dozens of others, A Message to the Twenty-First Century. But the last mentioned was not euphoric. This, the Fuji exhibit, paid lip service to brotherhood and then became a real calamity howler. Of the "angry young man with a camera school," this presentation's world was populated with thalidomide babies, animals being disemboweled in abbatoirs, riots, noise, and other pollutions and assorted problems. Technically well done, it surrounded the audience v.ith an inferno of shocking sights, glaring lights and oppressive sound. But it was the most massive cliche at the Fair. It almost became slapstick comedy . . . because the unrelieved piling of tragedy upon tragedy eventually provokes laughter instead of sympathy. And it failed (in my opinion) because it offered no solutions. The ultimate message I got from it was that the protesters must re-study their role in life. People soon turn off when all they hear are complaints (however justified), but respond when suggestions for improvements are made. This school of simply reporting calamity is passe and must change itself; stop filming the superficial surface; must start studying the problems; and must try to come up with answers. ... So far "in" that it's "out." At Expo '70, as at Vlontreal. and to Continued on next page 23