Cinematographic annual : 1930 (1930)

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CINEMATOGRAPHIC ANNUAL his work "Dynamic Symmetry" and others on this same subject, as being fundamentally sound, since they are based on Nature's laws. I am sure many producers were actuated in their choice of proportions, primarily, by a desire to approximate the proportions of the average theatrical stage. Just why the motion picture any longer should attempt to imitate the stage either in proportions or technique is difficult to understand. At this point I will venture a prophecy. The ideal screen, the screen that the near or distant future will evolve, will be a great circle, filling the entire proscenium arch of the theatre. Inscribed within this circle will be the picture, of the size, shape and proportions that best frame it. The sizes and shapes will change at will, whenever necessary. The eyes will never grow weary as these changes will furnish a pleasurable motion and variety, an interest aside from that which the drama or comedy will contain. The change to this type of screen, which I feel is the ideal one, as it provides an unlimited field for the imagination, will be accomplished by a slow, evolutionary process. It will require a far greater sense of values, dramatic, psychological and aesthetic, than we at present possess; a richer and altogether different method of telling a motion picture story. But since so much remains to be accomplished with the material we furnish the present screen, we should learn to walk before we attempt to run. The motion picture as a medium for story telling is unsurpassed, it affords boundless opportunities to the imagination, there is no limit to its power. Why, then, are stories told by motion pictures not more interesting and novel? Why in an art so modern, so progressive technically, should the methods of telling stories peculiar to other arts, such as fiction and the drama, be employed and considered good? Solely because so many understand these methods and know them to be safe, while so few really understand this new art of the motion picture. D." W. Griffith undoubtedly contributed more than anyone else, to enlarging the narrative power of the screen in raising it to new emotional heights. Murnau and others contributed greatly to the creation of new aesthetic values, in manner of story telling, in evoking moods, providing new and pleasurable movements and transitions, giving the temporal phase of the motion picture a meaning it never had before. For their contributions to its art these men will always be honored in the history of the motion picture. Mr. Griffith is especially assured of immortality. All stories of the life and emotion of man are not simple, some are necessarily complex, especially those which have a theme, yet only simple stories seem to be successful on the screen. Is the motion picture capable only of telling a simple, one-channel story, is this not an arbitrary, unnecessary restriction imposed upon it simply because we have been too conservative to ask it to do more? The stage, because of certain limitations, the immobility of its