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THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE FILM
Once started, however, the American producing firms made astonishing progress. Throughout the whole war period their output increased yearly until 191 8 found them completely dominating the world market, with interests in foreign producing companies and theatre controls that extended into England, France, Germany, and the Far East. In England, their acceptance was widespread, simply because there were no other films available, and because their shallow, superficial nature appealed to the post-war state of mind of the masses. British companies found it more profitable, and far less of a responsibility, to rent American films than to make their own. Moreover, American companies soon opened their offices in Wardour Street and on the continent for their own distribution, and remain there still. A few attempts to produce were made in England but the lack of both experience and capital rendered the resulting pictures unworthy of presentation. America continued with characteristic facility and slickness to make picture after picture of a hard, scintillating type. By her natural business methods she kept the standard up to a certain level, calculated to appeal to the lowest grade of intelligence. England and Europe were littered with these glittering, metallic movies, whose chief appeal lay in their sex and salaciousness, until the time came when marketing pictures by one's and two's began to be ridiculous, and Hollywood took to selling a whole year's output to foreign exhibitors and renters before the films themselves even were made. By this means she tightened her hold on the foreign market. The 'star-system,' catchpenny titles, scandalous publicity, and a hundred other tawdry schemes were devised to sell the goods to the European public. Business being business, without honour or morals, these movies were taken by British exhibitors, and the public flocked to them because of the cheapness and accessibility of the cinema. By degrees, the masses became saturated with pictures of the worst type. They did not know that others existed. They do not know now that many others exist, nor are they given the opportunity to know. Rarely is any foreign film (save an American) afforded a fair chance of success in this country. As then, the movie is rampant; the film is dormant.
There is no denying the logic that the Americans would have been foolish to loose their hold on the world market; and the method they adopted for retaining that hold was the disposing of their films en masse to British exhibitors. They devised a simple but clever system
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