Motion Picture Reviews (1934)

Four Motion Picture Reviews to have the same opportunity to get away from reality, not realizing that the handicap with which they contended was making pictures a dangerous pastime and conditioning them for life. We have erred ignorantly and now must suffer the consequences. The newer trends in education give us confidence that if our children have the best start in life physically, mentally and morally they can be trusted to meet life fearlessly and rationally even when they are very young men and women. And in this regaird it was especially gratifying to read the expressed opinion of Dr. Edgar Dale, of Ohio State University. He has made an exhaustive study of motion picture content and is Field Director of the work of teaching motion picture appreciation in high schools under the chairmanship of Dr. Zook of the U. S. Office of Education. Dr. Dale says: “When we come to the motion picture problem of the adolescent, we face a more difficult problem. Here I think that we must be much less inclined to restrict and safeguard the films to which these high school students go. Their job is that of growing up. They need guidance, but they also need to have an opportunity to make mistakes. If properly brought up, they have learned a great deal about what constitutes good taste in a variety of fields. High school youth who really have ideals we desire, are the ones whose parents have been continuously educating for responsibility and initiative. I haven’t any great faith in any restrictionist program which aims to prevent young people and adults from seeing the kind of pictures which they like. I do believe, however, that, with an adequate training in appreciation, using the best pictures, we can guide their tastes into socially valuable channels. This will be much easier if their movie tastes have not been perverted as children* We must remember that we develop tastes only by tasting and that we develop good taste by using good things. Every community has the responsibility of putting the best before its children.” ♦Italics my own. It then becomes the problem of the community to accept the responsibility of putting the best before its children. I have been interested in this problem of children and the movies for over ten years, and I know that the move for children’s matinees in Southern California follows more or less the same pattern as that in other communities. In the days of silent films we gradually won over thirty-five theatre managers to a plan of supervised weekly junior matinees at which no films were shown which had not been approved as suitable and of special interest to children between the ages of six and fourteen years. It was not then impossible to find material for these performances, but when sound entered the field the entire picture changed. Not only is the subject matter different, with greater realism increasing the sophistication and emotional strain, but the lack of action in many films also detracts from the interest for children, while increased noise and mature dialogue exhaust the younger audiences. In Southern California one by one the matinees failed to hold their audiences or their supporters. Children are still flocking to the movies, but they are not from the class of homes from which they used to come, and in most communities the pictures they see are generally without supervision. The women who have been interested in this problem for so many years are now limited to doing all they can to educate the public to selective attendance and are frankly admitting defeat in pursuading exhibitors to give family programs or to make any regular provision for approved children’s matinees. I now believe that each community should arrange balanced programs for younger children which would bring together all groups interested in child recreation; that the plan should include drama on the stage, music by the best available orchestras, story hours through public library groups, selected motion picture programs, and outdoor activities planned by playground associations, or the different girl and boy groups available in any community. It is a stimulating idea which is certainly not impossible of accomplishment and which ought to invite enthusiastic support from those interested in the broader outlook which it offers children.