Business screen magazine (1946)

paradox I'AKADOX: Ihc film hiisiiu-s*. iiia> not bi' J way of limine bill is certuinl> a «a> (>f life. I Ni\LR rHOUGiir 1 could write the words of the above paradox, because of an early experience I had. When I was first making the painful transition from Detroit to New York, I was sort of commuting between the two cities. which emphasized their differences. Conferences in Detroit were always very business-like and straight-line . . . Here's what we want! . . . Here's how we want it done! . . . How soon can we ha\e it? . . . and so forth. But a New York script conference used to confuse me . . . What do you think of this point of view? . . . Suppose we take a posture of spontaneity? . . . What are the ethical imperatives of this particular corporate perspective? . . . and so forth. Conferences in Detroit were like mass production technologies. But conferences in New York were like college bull sessions . . . and no more productive. Looking back in time, it was all very logical, but it ttxik me about five years to catch onto the fact that practically nobody in New York really meant anything he said. It was just a way of impressing the other people in the room with his cerebral capabilities. The most spaced-out meeting of my memory was during discussion of a slide-film for a linoleum maker. The senior writer (for the producer), and the ad manager ffor the client), actually spent a lull morning, a three hour lunch, anil h.d( the afternoon discussing whether the phrase in the script should be "I he American way of life" or "The American way of living." They were fools, the discussion was nonsense, and it inhibited my use of the phrases for years ... up until this column in fact. 12 Regular readers will recall that I tried to make two major points about slidelilms in our last issue . . . Numlier One. the hardware has never been standardized, and Number Two, you have to think about slideflim as a separate and distinct medium, with its own advantages, techniques, drawbacks, and Ireedoms. Now, whatever slidefilms may or may not be. they can never be a good medium for presenting an abstraction like the American way of life, or living, or what have you. These two Madison Avenue types were certainly talking about the subject in terms of million dollar movies, probably had million dollar movies! On the other hand, this particular subject cries out for multi-media presentation, in which slides and stills would certainly play a very important role. I am now involved in the planning sessions of an exposition which will use multi-media to depict the American way of lile. and we're using some 6.000 slides in dissolve units, a Motiva program, a kadeidoscopic combination of twelve screens, both vertical and horizontal crawls on widescreen filmslrip. and movies at .^."^mm. techniscope, and 16mm anamorphic. Furthermore, we don't even feel confident we'll be covering our subject adequately because we're limited to ten minutes in length, and how can you cover the American scene both adequately and fairly in only ten minutes? One thing you can put your money on . . . you're not going to do the job in a fifteen minute filmstrip for a linoleum manufacturer, in which you also incidentally ha\e thirteen minutes of linoleum selling and two minutes of politic. il philosophy. It is my own personal con\iction that if you try to use the wrong medium to tell your particular story, you will end up by denigrating the very values you are trying to communicate . . . not to mention wasting all that nice available budget. Kxperiences like these have led me to the theory that the film industry as a whole is a sort of micrivosm of the American scene. I hat coulil easily be the most pretentious statement of the year, so I'd better clarify the analogy. \f» A .»( l:^■< Our industry has its own ditlererj strata of vertical success . . . with leve called entertainment, educational, dtn umentary, television, industrial, ar\| amateur filmmaking. And within th vertical arrangement, we also have di ferent horizontal compartments of sui. cess . . . critical success, economi success, aesthetic success, intellectu^ and academic success, and even ove and-under-achievement success, I fact, you can name your own favoril type of arrogant snobbery and yok will find examples within the filij^i business. All analogies are dubious, but tl> analogy between U.S. society and th| film industry holds true right on dow to the fact that we both are exper encing a generation gap. with youn. people taking off on their own tangeni when it suits their psychic needs. Although there are some people i this industry who earn a very grea deal of money, and others who ear extremely little, or even none at a . . . there is a bond between us. Al filmmakers are in fact living a certai way of life. The world of film is separate sub-culture within America Society ... a specifically idcntifiabi way of life. ! I have met some people in this ii^ du.siry who might just as easily b^ grocery brokers or book publisher . . . people who happened to drifj into the world of film by gravitatioi . . . through a friend, a contact relative, a casual meeting on the sub way . . . but most of them drift ou; after a while. The committed film, makers are different . . . they have isi certain sense of dedication ... 0 excitement about their work . . . O; pleasure in doing just exactly wl they're doing ... of kxiking forwar*, to finishing up this picture so thc> can start on the next. And if you toll; them they had to get into .some othey kind of work for economic or heali or professional reasons, they woult stare at you as if you were daft. I'm fortunate that 1 get to a lot Ol different meetings of film people aIFl( over the country, (and also in othei§^ parts of the world). Nolxxly could mistake the gatherings of lilm peopU ♦ for any group in other industries \ "Paradox" is a rr/tular feature column w bused freelance scriptwriter. rillen by Stanford Sobel. a New York BUSINESS SCREEN jeenP