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Motion Picture Reviews Three
MOTION • PICTURE • REVIEWS
Published monthly by
THE WOMEN’S UNIVERSITY CLUB
LOS ANGELES BRANCH
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF UNIVERSITY WOMEN
Mrs. Palmer Cook, General Co-Chairman Mrs. John Vruwink, General Co-Chairman Mrs. Chester A. Ommanney, Preview Chairman Mrs. Charles Booth Assistant Preview Chairmen Mrs. Thomas B. Williamson
EDITORS
Mrs. Palmer Cook Mrs. J. Allen Davis Mrs. George Ryall
Mrs. Walter Van Dyke Mrs. John Vruwink
Address all communications to The Women’s University Club, 943 South Hoover St., Los Angeles, Calif. Advance Supplement is published and mailed approximately the 15th of each month.
10c Per Copy $1.00 Per Year
Vol. VI AUGUST, 1934 No. 2
EDITORIAL
Any so called reform movement runs the risk of alienating the very people who are expected to be most in sympathy with it. We mean by that that too stringent dictation or censorship is always objectionable to American taste and even the laudable purpose back of the Catholic Legion of Decency needs a clearer definition of its objectives and a broad tolerance in taste to win the backing which will insure success over a period of time. Undoubtedly the Hays office is dictating “clean pictures,” and for a time less sophisticated subject matter and treatment will result. But for how long? The box office will be the indicator, and at the final accounting films will probably be no better than the type which popular acclaim has indicated through attendance.
Do not mistake our comments for criticism of the purpose of the Catholic boycott. If the leaders are black listing such films as “Little Man What Now,” “Of Human Bondage” and “It Happened One Night” for children’s audiences, they have a brief. But if they wish all audiences to refrain from attendance at these pictures they lose the sympathy which their strong stand has awakened. They are “sophisticated.” But that much abused term has been used to cover “daring, vulgar and even dirty” in subject matter and treatment. These films are not. They are mature themes treated with taste and intelligence. “It Happened One Night” was delicious farce; the other two are mofe serious and less happy and will consequently have a smaller appeal to the public, but they are none the less worth acclaim for the taste with which in general the material has been handled.
It is essential that intelligent public opinion be unified. There is no doubt that the present policy of the Industry to make all pictures appeal to the mass mind is suicidal. The belief that all must appeal to the adult with a child’s mind is the cause of the present revolt on the part of the more intelligent public. And it is a revolt which cannot be pacified by a temporary reform. The public cannot be won back to the old attendance in the heyday of silent films. Talking pictures drew attendance for a time by the novelty of their mechanics. It was lost again by the thoughtless belief that the public wanted the type of entertainment prevalent on the New York Stage and released in tabloid newspapers, cheap periodicals and daring novels. The Industry is not generally concerned with the social value of their product but in the ready market. They try to appeal in all films to a national audience of many millions