The Motion Picture and the Family (Oct 1934 - May 1937)

2 THE MOTION PICTURE AND THE FAMILY February 15. 1937 WHAT'S NEXT IN HOLLYWOOD? By Alice Ames Winter Coach Credits Pictures With Aiding Speech Teacher Sends Film Pamphlet To The Parents EVERY month when the report cards of pupils at Shorewood High School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, are sent home to their parents a short bulletin dealing with some problem of adolescence which seems of paramount importance to the principal, Grant Rahn, goes with them. Not long ago this monthly message was entitled "Selecting Films Wisely." In the pamphlet Mr. Rahn pointed out that parents and schools should cooperate in helping the pupil to choose wisely the pictures he attends. "He really wants to invest his time and money in such entertainment as gives promise of being most worth while," Mr. Rahn said. "There is a growing number of screen attractions which are both profitable and enjoyable." Under the subhead, "What Can the School Do?" Mr. Rahn suggested classroom discussion of impending films of real worth; commending pupil attendance at films of this order, and publication of film appraisals written by the pupils in issues of the school organ, Ripples. All these methods are at present pursued in Shorewood High. In the future the plan is to publish periodically in Ripples a list of attractions recommended by critics who are generally regarded as competent. What Can the Home Do? Mr. Rahn's advice as to what the home might do was as terse and practical as his suggestions regarding the school. "Enlist family participation in building such a list of forthcoming attractions as the various members may in their reading find recommended as high class," he advised. "Check this family list weekly against the current offerings in the various theatres of the city as listed in the dailies. "Discuss in the family the merits of movies attended, their fidelity to the best in life, to the spirit of a piece of literature reproduced, or to history, as the case may be." The final comment was: "Improved appreciation of the better films depends upon a positive, constructive program of discriminating selection. Such a project requires effort, but such effort will draw the family closer together in common interest. Parents who have tried a plan such as this report that youth responds to it by ready participation and by noticeable growth in discerning appreciation." Films in County Schools From Atlanta, Georgia, comes the cheering news that all city and county schools now have regular motion picture programs. WHERE does realism end and imagination begin? For all drama and fiction authors feel like the famous Frenchman: "My friends, the truest things are not those that have happened." Even in this photographic art of pictures, producers all will answer that they must show the meanings of life and emotion rather than the mere literal outside of things. Nevertheless it is interesting to know that for Madame Walewska, Greta Garbo's new picture, infinite pains have been taken to bring across the water the actual imperial coach in which Napoleon rode during triumphal marches of the Napoleonic army across Europe more than a hundred years ago. But perhaps this is not mere literalism, and instead is really stirring to our emotional imagination. Just think! Once Napoleon really rode in the quaint obsolete thing. As for Charles Boyer, who is to play Napoleon opposite Garbo, again the two kinds of thrills move conjointly, for his five uniforms are actual reproductions of those of the great conqueror, the boots so built that he will be of the actual stature of Napoleon, the figure moulded to the slightly bowwindowed one with the square shoulders which we all know. And here's a picturesque bit of Hollywood's play on its own humor. Out at Metro-GoldwynMayer they are making four pictures with foreign backgrounds, so what more amusing than to see that the staff gets the right kind of food in its particular picture: bouillabaisse for the French in Espionage; shaslik for the Russians in Maytime; Irish stew for the Irish in Parnell; while roast beef and Yorkshire pudding are served up to the English in The Last of Mrs. Cheyney. The panorama of studio life is almost as swift-moving as any motion picture. Mr. DeMille in The Plainsman was well abreast of this movement, which is constantly emphasizing the idea of rhythm in pictures, for in that production the music was not at all plastered in afterward, but was an intrinsic part of plot and emotion in the very structure of the drama. So you want to watch for the name of Boris Morros, who was answerable for getting: Antheil to write the score for that picture, and who is making his influence felt in the new technique. Once he was with the Chauve Souris; now he is beginning to talk as if a movie script were a libretto for which composers will be writing the music. Morros has helned to bring to Hollywood, and the films, Leopold Stokowski and Werner Janssen. He says: "Rachmaninoff has expressed willingness to compose an original score for the films if he finds a scenario that pleases him." "And when," Morros adds, "Stravinsky saw The General Died at Dawn and heard the Janssen score, he also capitulated." Among the "colony" here is Arnold Schoenberg, one of the greatest of the moderns, lately from Germany, now teaching music in Los Angeles, still holding aloof from pictures, but concerning whom they have hopes. The mountains of music are rapidly coming to Mohammed Hollywood, and their beauty goes forth to the everwidening audiences which are estimated to have leaped to 83,000,000 a week. Meanwhile, Sol Lesser announces that he has persuaded Oscar Strauss in Vienna to capitulate to moviedom. So this month Strauss will be coming to Hollywood to create the musical score for Boy Blue, in which Bobby Breen is to appear. While we glance at the new names, we may also congratulate ourselves that we are soon to have more from tried formulas. One of the most valuable sound tracks ever recorded was recently rushed to Hollywood by plane. It is a sequence of opera scenes called Travitza, written by Herbert Stothart, who based them on Tschaikowsky's Fifth Symphony, and it is sung in chorus by the Don Cossacks of New York. For whom? For no less a duo than Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy in their new picture, Maytime. Our well-beloved Grace Moore in her next picture, When You're In Love, is to give us a greater variety than she has ever before offered on the screen, Vissi d'Arte from La Tosca, Schubert's Serenade, In the Gloaming, Sibonez, two especially composed songs, Whistling Boy and Our Song, and finally a bit of highbrow Metropolitan opera star comedv called Minnie, the Moocher, with bumps — and if you want to know" what that means, you'll have to go to see. We keep on bowing to the children, since a director like John Ford, veterans of the screen and stage like Victor McLaglen and C. Aubrey Smith, take second fiddle places in the next Shirley Temple picture, Kinline-'s classic, Wee Willie Winkie. Kinling seems cominar to his own on the screen. And why not? He was a wonderful story teller, and his characters all have both reality and imaginative interpretation. Perhaps One In a Million has stimulated popular infatuation with winter sports. At any rate, 250 people have gone from Hollywood up to Sun Valley Lodge in {Continued on Page 6) THE motion picture was credited by Oliver Hinsdell, dramatic coach at Metro-GoldwynMayer Studios, with being one of the most powerful influences on present-day speech in an address given before the recent meeting of the American Institute of Cinematography at Riverside, Cal. Emulate Actors' Speech "Whether you will admit it or not, we have already begun to emulate the speech of our motion picture actors," Mr. Hinsdell told his audience. "Time was when we used to arch our eyebrows and smile when we heard one of the family dare to use a broad Italian 'a' or to omit the good old burr sound of 'r', but now even those who live in the most remote parts of our country are becoming accustomed to the correct sounds and are even, consciously or unconsciously, forming the habit of using these very tones which they once derided. "The wise motion picture producer, always with his thumb upon the pulse of human opinions, has become aware that his audiences like, even demand, quality, and, perhaps in speech, more than anything else, his time and money are spent to find the actors and directors who can give the public what it wants. It has often been said that 'the camera does not lie.' Really, it is the 'mike' that does not lie. No contraption has been invented that can take away a nasal twang or localism. "The Motion Picture Academy of Fine Arts, organized for the furtherance of art in motion pictures, has for years offered awards for the best acting, male or female, the best cinematography, direction, best all round production, best original story and adaptation, and many other awards. They have completely neglected a very important award. Why can we not persuade them to consider an award for the actor or actress who has contributed most to better speech? It will do much towards making the actor speech conscious and I know of no better way to bring about speech reform." Youthful Offenders Sentenced To See Film The fine, ethical content of The Devil Is a Sissy prompted Probation Officer Swavely of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, not only to endorse the film when it played in that city but also to recommend it to youngsters who betrayed a tendency towards waywardness. The sentence to "see the film" proved by no means unpleasant and was productive of real good.