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suffers from a lack of equipment, but the artists engaged in this work are by no means inferior to those of the West. To be sure, their lack of sensitivity with respect to the presentation of screen plays is a lamentable shortcoming, but this is being gradually rectified. So long as we achieve perfection in such departments as play-writing, direction and photography, we should have to be satisfied. There is one exception, however, to be noted here; namely, the actor. It has become a matter of tradition in Japan to elevate good-looking men and women to stardom who have had hardly any training, and solely on the strength of their personality. Regrettable as it may seem, these actors have over¬ looked the fact that human appeal is an essential prerequisite in their profession. The truth is that the inferiority of Japanese films to those of the West is attributable, more perhaps than anything else, to the difference in the quality of their respective actors.
At the same time, the Shingeki of the past has already served its purpose, and it would be futile to expect any future advancement of this school with the participation of the old group of actors. In short, the works of the new playwrights referred to in a foregoing paragraph cannot adequately be presented by actors who are hampered with a hang-over from the past. For the play is preeminently the actor’s art.
This outcry, which rose chiefly in consequence of a realization of playwrights who are concerned with the Shingeki movement, is rather a belated one when compared with the situation in France, where screen authors themselves undertake the production of motion pictures; but it is none the less an evidence of the fact that there exists a distinct sense of unanimity in the attitude of our playwrights.
This movement is likely to provide an impetus, alike to the Shingeki and to the Cinema, linked as they are by joint interests, for the creation for the first time in Japan of an academism in art.
The object of this proposed school will be to train and develop actors in achiev¬ ing a really human quality of charm and refinement which comports with the common state of culture throughout the rest of the world.
The necessity of training stage actors simultaneously with film actors springs from the unevenness in the development of our culture and from the fact that stage plays other than those of a conventional type cannot be presented on a profitable basis; and it illbehooves us to neglect the filling up of this gap.
When this school is perfected, it will in all likelihood bring about a complete change in both the Shingeki and the Cinema. And when that day comes, we believe that Japanese films will be appreciated in Western countries as the equal — certainly not the inferior — to their own films.
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