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— 620. —
mechanism is not yet developed, it is still expensive, immovable and difficult to master — these are for the moment our surest protection. The real cause of our reluctance, however, is due to the fact that the sound-film has not yet assumed a satisfactory form. When we see marvellous photographs of marine fauna " explained " for us by a learned dialogue between a professor and his assistant, the photographs are quite sufficient to arrest our attention. The spoken passages are reminiscent of the pedagogue's observations on the beauty and utility of the oak and the reasons for growing pumpkins on the ground and not on oak-trees, of heavy " dramatisations " of school-books, of printed dialogues between teacher and pupil and of other sources of boredom; the fact that something is being shown once to spectators eager to learn is lost sight of. The running accompaniment of some more or less incompetent authority means nothing to us. Let us by all means hear the crash of thunder, the ripple of water, the breaking of waves and the raging of the storm, the breaking of stones and the whirr of machinery, but spare us the pretentious oratory of would-be Ciceros, who a little while before their film-talk began knew nothing of what they were to talk about, speakers who learn their parts like parrots, but contribute nothing of their own. Until the sound-film is combined with firsthand experience, we have no use for it. Until then sound-film in schools is a manifestation of fashion-mania.
If the film " Menschen im Busch " required an accompaniment of negro music, because " there must be sound " — even when a silent projection would have been perfectly intelligible — it means that the makers of the film under-estimated their medium. There is not this need of sound; even Rome is sometimes quiet.
We shall therefore wait patiently until the sound-film people have found the right use for sound. I am aware that it is dangerous to say such things. To criticise something new, even in a qualified form, is to lay oneself open a charge of reaction. But after all we are not dressmakers, who have to follow fashions.
Similarly, we shall not allow ourselves to be stampeded by the substandard film. We want it badly, look forward to it and should like to include it in our syllabus — but only when the small-size film and its equipment have reached the necessary stage of development. Not a minute sooner.
Substandard film and sound film in themselves do not exactly come within our category, since they are technical developments which should escape the danger of being quoted as instruments of fashion. And yet they cannot be excluded. They are fashions, because they have not yet, by any means, reached the stage when they can be used without difficulty. It may be regretted that the use of a medium should always necessitate maximum convenience, especially convenient and sure sources of supply; but it is unfortunately a fact. We cannot produce trained experts at a moment's notice and our friends of the educational film cannot be so easily