Screen Guilds Magazine (August 1934)

4 The Independents By THEM CARR Who are the independents whose pictures now and again steal the show? Mr. Carr, president of the Independent Motion Picture Producers Association and vice-president of Monogram Pic¬ tures, at the request of the Editors, ex¬ plains this important branch of the in¬ dustry. The PAST FEW YEARS have seen A a considerable change in the field of independent production, and have wit¬ nessed the definite re-alignment of in¬ dependent producers into two principal groups. Where formerly there were only the majors and the “quickies/’ there are now three classifications: The major companies—those belonging to the Hays organization; the major independents— those with definite releasing schedules and established distributing organiza¬ tions; and the “quickie” producers— with whom the term “independent” was formerly synonomous. The last group is composed of pro¬ ducers with no definite program and, also, the fly-by-night promoters, who make pictures on a shoe-string with no assured release. Many of this group produce cheap “sex” melodramas which pander to the more vicious elements of the populated centers and do irreparable harm to the industry itself. On the other hand, some of the “quickie” group are sin¬ cerely endeavoring to make a passable product—striving for personal recogni¬ tion or a major release. It is the dis¬ reputable class that has given the “quickie” production a bad name. The new order of things came about in this way: During the period of pros¬ perity, the production costs at many ma¬ jor plants became excessively high. With the depression, and the advent of dou¬ ble-billing, came a greater market for less expensively produced pictures, and brought about the organization of sev¬ eral new companies, operating on short schedules and with greater production economy. Exhibitors were crying for cheaper pictures. Yet, if they were to be shown on a double bill, or in first-run houses, they must measure up to a high stan¬ dard. The independent companies in the top brackets were able to fill the de¬ mand. Eliminating much of the dead- wood of the major companies by cutting out permanent overhead, and making each picture carry its entire cost, these independents brought in a quality pro¬ duction on a budget far below that of their major competitors. (Continued On Page Twenty-two) HANDS By Bessie Lasky HANDS of the mist— Small, white jade ornaments gleaming on fretted harp-strings, pale with the music of fawns. HANDS of the toiler— Brawny-lumped, turning over soil* working to feed the world, and to enrich Nature’s growth. HANDS of the slayer— Mangled, gnarled, snuffing out breath of Life, to fructify his own desires. HANDS of the virgin— Pale, tapering, submissive; crossed gently over untouched bosoms of purity. HANDS of the sinner— Bold, stunted, groping wantonly, for lust in the fleshpots of life. HANDS of the builder— Sturdy, powerful, twisting steel under the sky, for the refuge of man. HANDS of the white sister— Soft, decisive, protective, telling her beads for the glorification of souls. HANDS of the fallen one— Tangled, disjointed, playing with tinsel, like a child reaching for stars. HANDS of the Creator— All-powerful, divine, ever recasting the mould of human destiny and understanding. HANDS of His children— Hopeful, obedient, patient, reaching thru spans of Time, until one day the whole may be perfected. DRAMATIC ART By Lawrence E. Sterner Screen censorship is under fire. What are “decent” and “indecent” pictures? That is the question. Our “czar” censor apparently knows little or nothing of Dramatic Art or her offspring, Poetic Justice. Consequently the decent and the indecent, the refined and vulgar, are ex¬ hibited generally in hopeless confusion. Poetic Justice—of which even, “Three Little Pigs” may be mentioned as a shin¬ ing example—is the only safe guide when judging purity and impurity in film, stage or any dramatic production. None but artists of true distinction are there¬ fore competent critics and worthy cen¬ sors, where censorship is advisable. Such artists are rare. The Screen Guilds’ Magazine American Epic By NUNN ALLY JOHNSON '"The AMERICAN EPIC in the ** Movies is generally a story based on a compass point. It is a masterpiece in which the general trend of the charac¬ ters is West. This makes it easy to spot the villain: he’s the man who wants to head East. An eastbound character is obviously a swine; a westbound family is the salt of the earth, the backbone of America, and as dull a group of people as you ’d be likely to find in a day ’s run. The American epic is rarely pre¬ meditated. It springs from a few mo¬ ments of discouraged silence when the story that was originally planned begins to come unglued. It is then that some¬ one heaves a sigh of regret and says, Oh, what the hell, let ’s go on and make an American epic out of it,” This is a fine constructive idea, for what the boys have now got is, briefly, no story, and if there is anything that looks like an American epic it is, briefly, no story. What they have is a series of incidents which don’t seem to belong even on the same lot, much less in the same picture. Converting the mess into an epic solves everything; the incidents can now be used with a clear conscience; date titles, “1909,” “1919,” and “1929,” show that all loose ends to the narrative have been straightened out during the lap dissolves. If the subsequent development of the story and picture varies at all it is only in unimportant detail. Most of the ac¬ count is standardized and immutable. For instance, an epic takes in three gen¬ erations; this is obligatory. In the be¬ ginning the leading role is “Wayne Gar- funkle” as a boy; he has a father, a mother, and a sister with a weakness for being attacked. They are all headed West. About the middle of the epic Wayne Garfunkle is the star of the picture in the full burst of young manhood; gaffer is dead, mother has aged 75 years since the last sequence, and the sister is still on the run, one jump ahead of a new crop of seducers. Now comes all that there is of the plot: Wayne, a true blue westbound man, is in love with a girl who wants to head East. They solve the situation by settling down in Kansas City in a log cabin which is today the site of the union depot. In the last third of the picture Wayne is 185 years old and prematurely bent double. He wears enough powder in his hair to whiten Sally Rand’s carcass for ten nights running. His mother is (Continued On Page Twenty-two)