Amateur Movie Makers (Dec 1926-Dec 1927)

NOW It Can Be Told What Happened When Montclair Made Its Own Movies By Charlotte Potter Geer ONCE upon a time there lived in a New Jersey Suburb a woman whose imagination rebelled against the changeless round of Bridge parties, amateur plays, dances and cake sales for the purpose of raising funds for local benevolences. Being blessed with a so-called artistic temperament, which is the world's best alibi for one who leaps before she looks, she conceived and sold to her friends the idea of producing an amateur motion picture. The organization that succumbed to her enthusiasm was the Montclair Women's Club, a hitherto sane and sensible group of ladies, much given to chastising the Legislature and advising the Mayor. With few qualms and no complexes they endorsed the plan in toto and nobly set about forming a series of committees designed to put a move into movies. In committee, the plan seemed perfectly simple and simply perfect. There was to be a local news reel in which Montclair at work and play was to be snapped unawares. There was to be a children's comedy in which fond parents were to have unlimited opportunity to see their offspring do cute nothings before the kindly camera. The feature was to be a discarded scenario of an ob COMBINATION SALAD Emily Orten and Carlos Fetterolf Agree On The Lettuce VE As )NA HARMON Tiffany Window solete movie drama procured from a friendly film company. "Lord and Lady Algy" was one of the dramas discussed for possible production. The moment when the director informed the central committee that no amateurs should attempt to emote in front of his particular megaphone was the first disillusionment of the production. He maintained that drama is to difficult for untrained movie actors and that a three-reel comedy would be far easier to produce and cast. The five-reel drama was therefore abandoned and in its place the committee concentrated on a feature comedy and a one-reel fashion show plus the news reel and the children's two-reeler. In yielding to the director in this first clash the local group made an error which their emulators would do well to avoid. Slapstick comedy proved itself much more difficult to put over than drama, and the script, which was the product of the director's brain, was not nearly as amusing in the filmed version as it was on paper. The complete absence of a plot bewildered the audiences and the titles lacked that subtle twist which brings a laugh from those who come to snoot. In the preliminary work of the committee was the selection of several homes whose interiors were commensurate with well known movie standards. Staircases, private ball rooms, mammoth conservatories and oak panelled libraries were selected and catalogued, and here arose disappointment No. 2. In these days when one's house is filled with every description of lamp it had not occurred to the amateur producers that any further lighting would be required. The discovery that a transformer, special cables, etc., must be installed in every interior to be filmed almost wrecked the movie. Eventually a club member donated the use of an empty building and bv renting some flats from a professional studio the interiors were accomplished in one week of intensive shooting. The Cooper-Hewitts and the baby spots and all the rest were rented for a huge sum, an electrician was engaged to tend them, the transformer was put in the temporary studio and {Continued on page 46) Fourteen