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VII THE GERMAN FILM
Not so long ago, it was general to look to the German cinema for the real uses of the film medium. A single German production meant a promised relief from the twenty American metallic movies which shouldered its London presentation. The simplicity of the German cinema then indicated that the intelligence and artistry, the creative imagination and craftsmanship, so essential to the production of a unified work of art, lay in the studios of Neubabelsburg and Staaken. It became natural to believe that a film coming from a German studio, made by a German director, cameraman, architect, and actors would be of certain interest. During that period of the German cinema which culminated in The Last Laugh and Tartuffe, this was the truth. So far as was known at that time, the Germans were the only producers of intelligent films in the world, with the exception, perhaps, of a few isolated examples of the early French school and the heavy pictures of the Swedes. Germany was wise in that she put her best talent into the creation of an industry, subsidised by the Government; but she reckoned without the influence of the American movie on the audiences of the world. The Germans were unable to realise that, outside their own country, few people of intelligence and good taste ever went to the cinema. We know that the general public had become saturated with the artificiality of the Hollywood movie. It was quite unable to cope with the meaning that the serious-minded German contained in his film. The masses had little, if any, experience of the cinema as a means of dramatic expression. They were shocked at and did not fully comprehend the sombre, darkly lit, intensely powerful German film. They knew nothing of psychology, of decorative beauty, and of the intrinsic reality of the cinema. They continued to show interest in the movie. The German film flourished awhile, sparkled with individual efforts, developed technical resources to a pitch of perfection and
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