Film and Radio Guide (Oct 1945-Jun 1946)

6 FILM AND RADIO GUIDE Volume XII, No. 8 They also offer fair yardsticks by which the Grand Canyon, the Empire State Building, and the Eiffel Tower may be proven to be big. But for social reasons the sap must wear clothing, and we doubt that were Eve still living her feminine nature would permit her to wear fig leaves for more than one year, especially with apple trees to provide a change in style. Moreover, there is that perverse attitude of the female sap which makes mothers’ dresses old-fashioned, grandmothers’ quaint, great-grandmothers’ adorable, and only the great-great capable of attaining a state of permanency, since they alone are heavenly. If pictures must entertain the presence of a garbed member of the fair sex, there seems to be only one answer, and that is to make five or six different shots of the scene, each portraying the dear lady in a different costume, from Godey’s Book up to “Today.” Then, as the styles change, the harassed distributor can insert the one using the current issue. In some cases, his film inspectors will be compelled to work fast to keep in touch with Paris. Those who haven’t the funds for this procedure had better stick to lady toads and salamanders — at least they are safe bets until evolution or mutation gets in a telling blow. Photography should no longer play a vital part in this problem, since it has reached nearperfection ; but there are some photographers, especially those in the “Tight Little Isles,” who don’t know it. This isn’t always too disturbing, since the dialects going with such “Henglish” pictures are like Josh Billings’s tight boots : they make one forget all one’s other ills. In Tarf/ef For Toiiight most people could understand only one word and that was spoken by an American (we said an American, not a New Yorker). After female raiment, the automobile seems to be the next major offender as a dater. In this immediate postwar (or near postwar) period, this doesn’t mean much ; but the battle of models will soon be on again, and woe to the offending producer who shows a square radiator when round ones are the vogue. That is a positive sin to juvenile minds (and some teachers as well as pupils have them — the minds we mean, not the autos) . Some able psychologist should make an analysis of why a 1930 auto should be so funny in motion pictures when schoolroom inhabitants will endure them without a grin in textbooks, and when they will also endure with perfect aplomb maps that still show Nagasaki, the “Solid” South, “time belts” in the U.S.A., and Russian boundaries. They will also follow the same curricula that were followed when Ben Harrison was president, will continue to solve problems wherein butter sells for fifteen cents a pound and chickens go at two bits each, will worry over Caesar’s language, will measure space between cities in miles instead of hours, and will flunk a kid for not knowing how many pecks in a bushel. This situation was strongly impressed on yours truly not so long ago in the following manner. I was seated beside the President of a Rotary Club of a large city, where I was booked as the speaker of the day. A man next to me, noticing by the announcement card that I was in educational work, took the liberty of commenting that teachers did funny things. I agreed and asked him in what way he had discovered this. He said his boy was studying interest in arithmetic. and the lad had sought his help with his home work. He (that is, the father) wanted to know of what use it was to study interest, and he answered his own question by taking a small notebook from his pocket. He opened to an interest table in the book and said, “There is all the interest I have ever needed to know, and I have been head of a big lumber firm for years. In fact, I haven’t needed that because the bank doesn’t take my figures — it has tables of its own.” “But,” I rejoined, seeking to draw him out, “you may not always have that book with you.” In a flash he snapped back, “If I didn’t, I could easily get one; I’ll bet there are fifty in this group.” “Yes,” I returned, still seeking to draw him out, “but didn’t someone have to make that book?” At this he gave forth one of the best bits of educational philosophy I have ever heard. He said, “Yes, someone did make it, and someone also made that electric light, but I didn’t. I snap a switch and use it. If I had to go around making everything I need, I would never have the biggest lumber yard in this city.” MORAL: I showed a picture to that group, and there were some out-of-date items in it, but no one bothered about that — it was the overall view that they sought, and they got it. They were too hig to see tiny flaws: “Errors like straws upon the surface flow; He who would search for pearls must dive below.” Are those pupils and teachers who see the flaws seeking the truth ? Are you as a teacher failing to do yoar duty by not taking this splendid opportunity to teach this truth, which is greater than all superficial faults? Copyright, 1946, B. A. Aughinbaugh