Film Spectator (1927-1928)

February 5, 1927 Page Five merits of the picture. There is one extraordinary shot showing the dead traversing a cloudy thoroughfare that is a monument to the technical genius of Roy Pomeroy. * ♦ * One That Pommer Made in Germany Faust is the work of an unrestrained Pommer, working under a system which he dominated. It is a magnificent achievement, with a depth of spirituality which American producers seldom attain. It is too intellectual to match Barbed Wire in audience appeal, consequently under the industry’s dollar standard it will be rated as inferior to that picture, but if I were in the producing business I would rather have to my credit one Faust than a dozen Barbed Wires. A picture like Faust adds to the hardships of a reviewer’s life. It makes our ordinary run of pictures appear so trivial. To consider it and Twinkletoes as products of the same method of expression is to put the Colleen Moore picture under a heavy load. I have seen quite a number of pictures since I viewed Faust and I looked at all of them with the eyes that beheld the majesty of the German production, while still under the spell of that extraordinary artistic triumph and with the new conception of the screen that it gave me. It has created within me a feeling of discontent with our factory-made product that might have entertained me if I had not seen Faust. But Faust itself is not without blemish. Like Barbed Wire, it sags in the middle, but when the real tragedy of its love story begins to develop, it sweeps onward to a great ending in a manner that earns my unbounded respect for the picture mind responsible for it. It is a simple love story that might have had Hollywood for its locale, or Amsterdam or Calcutta, but it has the glamour of an old-time setting, the romance of clothes that used to be worn, story-book architecture and scenery that an artist dreamed. The major fault of Faust is that it is done too well. There is so much of it that it over-feeds the aesthetic sense and dulls the power of appreciation. I believe the ideal way to see it would be to make two trips, viewing half of it one night and half the next. It would tend to better digestion of its merits. Like all the Pommer pictures, including the two he has made here, it reveals an extraordinary blending of beauty and drama. There is not a shot in Faust that is not a wonderful example of composition, lighting and photography used effectively to maintain the atmos An established reputation for handling the greatest variety of the finest silks. BOLGER’S 6510-6514 Hollywood Boulevard 7615 Sunset Boulevard phere of the production and to advance the story. I can not recall the exact words in the main title which characterize Faust as a poem in pictures, or something to that effect. That is exactly what it is — an exquisite piece of poetry, related on the screen by its master poet, and to enjoy it to the uttermost you must so regard it. It is more than a drama of a great love, more than a story of supreme emotion. It is a product of the newest art that unfolds to us the limitless possibilities of that art when its expression is left to the free exercise of a brain that understands more than any other the extent of the possibilities. ^ sk “Faust” Has Great Intellectual Appeal F.\UST was directed by F. W. Hurnau, who directed The Last Laugh also. In this country we know of nothing notable he has done Without Pommer’s supervision. He is making a picture in Hollywood for Fox and not until it is released can we measure his real ability as a director. All we know of his work here thus far is that he already has exceeded his shooting schedule by a couple of months or so and is proceeding cautiously. We know that Du Pont, made famous as the director of Variety, failed deplorably in his first effort to make a picture in Hollywood without Pommer’s co-operation. The most notable work of five different foreign directors being under Pommer’s supervision makes logical the conclusion that the chief credit for the notable work must belong to him. I credit him with the virtues of Faust as I have no way of knowing how much Murnau contributed to them. M.-G.-M., in Americanizing Faust, failed to give Pommer any credit for it, his name not appearing on the screen. Even Paramount, which had him under contract, omits giving him screen credit for supervising Barbed Wire. The immensity of the letters that record Rowland Lee’s name as its director perhaps left no room for the mention of Pommer as supervisor. It is a called a Lee-Pommer production, without stating what Pommer had to do with it, an oversight that did not embrace the art director, photographer and others. Probably nothing smaller, nothing betraying the characteristic meanness of some of our picture minds, than Metro’s deliberate slighting of Pommer’s contribution to Faust, ever has disgraced an art. But when we compare Pommer with those responsible for the slight it becomes laughable. If some of the people who control American pictures had a sense of humor they would die laughing at themselves. Emil Jannings’ characterization in The Last Laugh was not such as to develop all the sympathy the part might have called forth, but in Faust he gives a magnificent performance that is comparable with the best work of our American actors. Camila Horn is the Marguerite of our dreams — young, blonde and beautiful, so unlike the hefty sopranos who generally sing the part. The Faust of Gustav Eckmann is in every way adequate. But it is not the acting that makes Faust a great picture. It is the extraordinary breadth of the conception, the amazing production given it and the intellectual treatment of the theme. Even those who think the story drags can not fail to be impressed by the artistic qualities of the picture, and its appearance on American screens will have a tendency to make us demand similar excellence in the works of our own studios. That Paramount realized this