Celluloid : the film to-day (1931)

32 CELLULOID British director except Grierson has yet appreciated how much England has to give to the screen, or has the toughness or the conviction of his principles to make an out-of-doors picture. There will be those of the film trade who will argue that the public does not wish to be entertained by anything except human dramas and slop sentimentality, sophisticated bed-passion and revue choruses. If this is so, it is curious that so many out-of-doors films have been great successes, and that Chang still charms its audiences. Personally, I attach tremendous significance to the widespread popularity of the German mountain film, The White Hell of Pitz Palu, largely because in many districts filmgoers wrote to their local cinemas asking for the film to be shown, in some cases demanding a revival. I refer, of course, to the original synchronized version and not to the Universal " alltalking " copy that was put on the market later. If the producers ask why the public preferred this simply-made film to the newest four-hundred-thousandpounds extravaganza in colour, I can willingly tell them — because The White Hell of Pitz Palu fulfilled some of the elementary duties of the proper cinema which the four-hundred-thousand-pounds extravaganza in colour did not — because it showed mountains and snow and people far from the muck and artificiality of the studios — because the public did not know the actors by name — because for once they were able to forget Elstree and Hollywood ever existed — they forgot the horrors of the star-system and of faked scenery. And after many months of bleating speech they were shown again that a film could be clean, healthy,