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Page Seventy-four "The Digeit of the Motion Picture Industry" CAMERA! YEAR BOOK ARE YOU A CRITIC? By Alfred Hollingsworth The ordinary man or woman is in- capable of forming any judgement on a play or picture! They can tell you that "they like*' or "do not care - ' for it, and then they may try to criticize it by saying that "they would never have acted that way." That this is perfectly childish, they do not seem to be able to com- prehend. As if they were ideal per- sons possessing the highest and best characters, morals, intellect, judge- ment and motives—and yet this is just what they assume when they say that "they never would have acted that way." Even at that, this opinion is merely their idea, which they have formed upon the impulse of the moment. They have not acquired the ability to analyze and compare; they have not even any starting point except them- selves, upon which to base a compari- son, and when we realize how very little the average person knows of his own psychology, we begin to see how puerile must be his expression of "ideas" which he mistakes for criti- cism. Until a person has acquired the abil- ity to analyze and dissect and com- pare, he has no basis for his judge- ment—no knowledge—and is merely expressing his ideas which are of no value to anyone, not even to himself —for he actually does not know what he does believe. Unfortunately, every person, no matter how limited his in- telligence or experience, feels himself qualified to pass judgement on what he considers drama and acting, and yet there is not one person in five hundred including those in the theatrical pro- fession, who has any clear conception of what constitutes drama or acting. Ask almost any actor what acting is —and the best you'll get out of him is "Holding the mirror up to Nature!" and he has slight idea as to whether that means looking at a nude woman in a mirror—or telling dirty stories in front of a bar. Up to the present time the pitiful habit has obtained of judging a pic- ture by the mere technical and mech- anical details, and the exhibitor and producer and critic have encouraged the public to pick a picture to pieces upon these lines, and we listen to long arguments as to whetner parlor matches were in vogue at a certain date, whether an Indian mounted from the opposite side of his horse from that of a white man—whether a Scotchman tilted his cap over his right or left ear, etc.,—and yet the things that really matter, the express- ing of emotions, the working out of the plot, the fidelity to Nature and art, are never discussed. The mere details are important, yes, but it takes a childish mind to find de- light in picking them out—the kind of mind that delights in Chinese puz- zles—and Chinese puzzles have slight dramatic value. The point of criticism should be the acting, the drama, the story—not whether the hero should have worn square toed shoes, or con- gress gaiters. There are a few critics in the United States, perhaps five, who are competent to recognize the technique of drama and acting, and capable of giving intelligent criticisms. But the usual so-called critic is led astray by his desire to appear humorous, and write the Alan Dale sort of stuff, wherein he refers to actors as "sticks" —making doddering attempts to pro- voke mirth," and labels some woman as "A bovine biped, with the antics of a cow and the blatt of a sheep!"—and the silly actor and silly public are convulsed over what they call "a scathing criticism" which in fact is simply an escape of bile from a per- sonality none too pleasing at best. If the producers and exhibitors would foster a demand for intelligent criticism and appreciation, there is a possibility that the art of criticism might be developed and the public taught to appreciate a picture or a play from an intellectual basis rather than from a mechanical one. The pro- ducer may ask why he should educate the public? The answer is, that the present pub- lic is rather tired of the inane same- ness of the present pictures, and that these pictures do not appeal to the class of people who take an interest in intellectual amusements. The pro- ducer is, or at least, should be, look- ing forward to developing his produc- tions to the highest degree, and com- plains that the public does not appre- ciate his best efforts, at times. Yet he has educated a certain part of the public along certain lines, and he can- not hope for them to develop a sudden appreciation for his efforts as long as he debases their tastes and panders to puerile intelligence. God save the drama whose chief criticism depends upon whether an actor should wear a snake skin hat band, or whether it should be of braid- ed horse hair! There is nothing that would be of greater value in any newspaper than to have a department of real criticsm —not a mere expression of opinion, but criticism that analyzed and dem- onstrated the why and the wherefore of the opinions expressed. In other words, an educative criticism, that would form a standard and a basis from which the public could learn to appreciate, to judge of the value of a picture, according to its approximating Nature and Art. Art is the endeavor of the animal, man, to reproduce his impressions of Nature—and Acting is the represent- ing the human emotions by the use of the natural and artifical languages. Now we have something to start from—some basis on which to form our judgement—some standard by which to go. If we judge a picture from this standard, then we know that the nearer Nature, truth, we get, the better Art it is—but we must also con- sider that Art is an endeavor to im- prove on Nature. Some one will yell at me, "Nature can't be improved on!" All right, we'll turn him loose, naked upon the sands, let him get stone bruises hopping from rock to rock—and feed him upon raw meat— and see how soon he'll yell for a pair of trousers, an auto, and a meal at the B & M! Art has no right to exist if it does not improve upon Nature, and the next time a director tells you to "Be natural" you'll know that he is asking you to act just as he would—and that means to be commonplace—and the commonplace has no place in drama any more than a butcher shop has a place in the art of painting. What the director should mean, is, for you to be true to the character that you're interpretating—which is quite a different thing from giving an imitation of the director being "natural." To these directors, being natural is something similar to the iron imita- tion stags and rabbits that decorate the near-millionaire's lawn. They may look natural—but they are not Art— and therefore are an eyesore. To secure drama we must show per- sons under the stress of great emo- tions—whether comic of tragic—and as that is not the normal state—then it follows that we must learn from Nature what would be the natural out- come of these emotions—and until we learn to analyze these emotions, we cannot arrive at any basis for the judgement of acting—and we see how little qualified the ordinary person is to express an opinion on acting, for the psychology of the emotions is a life study and representing these emo- tions requires a life time of work and study, yet every school boy and girl imagines that they are qualified to tell an actor what acting is! ARRANGING PHOTOPLAY MUSIC Music is to pictures what an accom- paniment is to the song. The accom- paniment should always be subservi- ent to the voice. The music of the pictures should be subservient to the picture. The moment the music be- comes jarring it is self-evident that there is something materially wrong. The art of sychronizing music to pictures is a difficult one. With the many cut-backs, jumping from one scene to another makes it extremely difficult at times to judge which is the paramount thorac of the picture. So often we find three different scenes being enacted figuratively at the same time, which, of course ulti- mately reach cojointly a climax, but until the climax is reached it is very hard to judge which theme would be most advantageous to use. This, as you can readily see, makes it extremely incoherent, to the audi- ence. They would feel that there was something wrong, but could not tell the cause. The conductor is a very important and essential fact in the interpretation of a musical score, for a picture as w-ell as a song, an opera or a sym- phony. The perfectly synchronized score can be ruined by a poor conduc- tor, who has none of the essentials of artistry in his make-up. and on the other hand a throw-together score can be made to appeal perfectly in the hands of an artistic conductor. The conductor must feel the pulse of the picture, and use his themes ac- cordingly, giving expression to the music and at the same time playing it with the music interpretation which the score calls for. At times the man in the projection booth is to blame. When he gets tired or when it is late in the evening he will speed up the picture to such an extent that to follow the music as written would be disastrous. This is where the art of the conductor comes in. He would not only see, but feel this spedeing, and he could accelerate the music in proportion, for if anything should suffer, rather let the music than the picture. As we said before, the music is either a good or a bad accompaniment to the picture. The moment the music becomes paramount to the picture it is not only inartistic but absolutely wrong. There is a great and interesting charm in writing music for pictures, and if more time were given the com- posers, better music would be the re- sult. But as a rule, after the picture is completed the composer is given but a short allotment of time to com- plete his part of the work, which means untold labor and thought. Of course, the composer cannot synchronize his music to the picture until the sequence of scenes is decided upon, for so often it happens that after the score is complete a change of mind will introduce a new scene, thereby disrupting the score. For in- stance: the melody of an Intense love scene Is rolling along smoothly and ends with the love scene, making an impressive bit of composition last- ing two minutes or more. Suddenly, into the middle of the scene, or towards the end of the scene, a forty or fifty foot riot scene will be Intro- duced, then closing with the remain- ing part of the love scene. From the composition standpoint, this is chaotic, because the love scene is marred. However, it Is most fascinating work, and I believe that the »ynchroni- zation of music to pictures is still in its infancy and predict that all of the picture studios will eventually have scores written to their different pic- tures.