A hundred million movie-goers must be right... (1938)

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romance is mainly sexual. Crime. The word itself compels attention, excites interest. Crime! And we are on guard, every instinct of self preservation awakened. Consciousness of how much law and its enforcement have been corrupted, knowledge "that an unseen thumb is always tilting the scales of justice/' intensifying our inherent fear of the criminal, makes crime surefire in provoking sympathy. Dangers inherent in the elements, the wind, rain, snow, lightning, the hurricane, blizzard and cyclone . Deception, secrecy, partial mystery or letting the audience in on something of which one or more of the characters are unaware; complete mystery or whodunit. Action ; the chase and ambush ; dangerous stunting, narrow escapes, scaling the heights, exploring the depths, collisions and smashups; speeding, careening ambulances, fire trucks, police cars; gunfire, death. Production, or spectacle, pomp, lavishness of display, striking decorations, big scale investiture, size, class, flash, unique staging and costuming, pageantry and tableaux, mass movement of property, people and animals, tourist and travelog values. Comedy: From the sublime to the ridiculous, the lofty to the commonplace ; harmless and innocuous exaggerations and expositions designed for surefire laughter. Romance, adventure, crime, mystery, comedy, action, exciting personalities, production, music and dancing are high concentrates of entertainment, the very essence of Hokum, as exhilerating as black coffee, or champagne. In fact those stimulants are used right along to resuscitate weak and wabbly movies, to fuse them with new life, to quicken a lagging interest. When does hokum obtrude? In Chris Bean, furthering possession and dispossession of the valuable paintings were the two main pursuits. Upon the outcome of that conflict depended the happiness of three adults and two children, romancebound. In the screen version, just as the maid's struggle to keep the paintings approached a final test of its legality, with suspense pitched at peak tension, for no 162