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THE AIM OF THE FILM IN GENERAL
According to the treatment of the theme, the dramatic incidents of the narrative may not be of primary interest to the audience, but rather the effect of these incidents on the characters who have provoked them by their behaviour. Again, the theme may be inanimate, recording the soul of some great organisation or industry, or indicative of some vast undertaking. And again, it may develop the intimate personality of a single being by plaiting together as a unified whole a continuity of selected incidents, which singly are of little significance.
In this manner, by utilising the means arising out of the nature of the medium itself, the film sets out to be a form of expression, presenting persons, objects, and incidents in a way entirely different from any other medium, and utilising resources unavailable in other means of artistic expression. It will be seen also that such values asj 'acting' and sets become but raw material for assembly in the finali film construction. The complete insignificance of the star-system in this respect is obvious. In fact, I even suggest that there is no suchl thing as 'film acting.'
Provided that it is conceived in a filmic sense, the subject-matter of a film may be derived from anywhere. Every human thought, every incident of life or imagination can inspire a theme. The history of the world is a storehouse from which themes may be drawn at will. Choice can only be governed by sociological reasons; whether it be of interest or of no appeal to an audience. In the case of the fiction film, it is necessary for the plot to be well balanced and well constructed. Most good films are marked by the simplicity of their themes and their logical development of action. The theme may be found in a play, a novel, a magazine, a novelette, a newspaper, a history book, a memoir, an encyclopaedia, a dictionary or a fifteenthcentury incunable. Better still, in the case of the semi-fiction picture, it can be found in the street, in the trains, in the factories or in the air.
There is a wealth of cinematic inspiration, for instance, in the paintings of the Flemish and early Dutch painters. For La Passion de Jeanne d'Arcy Dreyer went to the best possible source of inspiration in the mediaeval French miniatures, whilst in his crowd scenes there was the influence of Bruegel. The atmosphere of Murnau's Faust was gained through an intimate knowledge of the work and feeling of Diirer, of his grand pictorial value, whilst again there was a hint of Bruegel in the types of the townspeople in the plague-stricken
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