Movie Makers (Jan-Dec 1932)

199 The time element and cine planning EDWARD J. BALTHAZAR It is easy to avoid movies which are, at best, really stills A WELL KNOWN trouble of many cine amateurs is the persistence of a "still consciousness." The habit of viewing the representations of things as still pictures is so ingrained in the race that it may explain the trouble. Many of the amateur movie maker's inspirations come from still pictures — photographs or paintings. No wonder, therefore, that, with the desire to take his little son of four on the knee of grandmother, he is at first satisfied with shooting five or ten feet of the pose and is contented with a result which is rightly the aim of a still photographer. A still picture is relatively instantaneous. It has no reference to time. Its effect is to blot out time from the motion of things, so that a representation of a racing car going better than a hundred miles an hour does not appear to move. A motion picture camera cannot do otherwise than represent action and action necessarily involves terms of time. Let some Einstein figure out timeless motion, if he can. Should the amateur apply the time element in planning a film of his infant son on his grandmother's knee, he will arrive at results which will open to him as by magic the true technique of the motion picture camera. In the first place, it can be suggested safely that he keep his first inspiration, whatever it may be, as the climax of the film he is planning. And, since time is divided into past, present and future action, he may set aside the climax as the present action towards which the past action is to evolve and from which his future action is to proceed to a logical and natural finale. It can now be seen that past action is merely the introduction to the climax, that is, in the present instance, to the scene of the child in arms. The amateur may use any introduction he will. Should he desire to use more rather than less film and should the child's grandparent not reside in the same town, her arrival may be taken first. He may choose the garden as the setting for the whole film, starting his action with grandmother's entry into the garden. Little Bobby is playing at his sand pile. He arises as grandmother seats herself on the garden seat, goes to her and she may be filmed raising him to her knee. Any introduction will do, provided that it leads inexorably to the climax. Having recourse again to the law of motion as evolving from elements of time, he will now seek to prolong the static idea of his first inspiration with action. In other words, instead of being merely contented with a pose of the child on the grandmother's knee, he will seek some action that can transpire thereon to avoid the still quality of the scene which first inspired him. Bobby may be either induced to go to sleep or to clamber down and return to his sand pile. But the best of a thousand bets is that he will ask for a story. Here is an opportunity to prolong the action of the climax by including the narration of a fairy tale. A commonplace method would be to use titles to show what grandmother is saying but that would take a great deal of title footage. Why not insert scenes of the story itself, intersplicing them with shots of grandmother and child during the story telling. Although some amateurs may balk at the idea, it is suggested that a short library film be purchased, cut up and spliced between scenes of grandmother telling the story. It would be wise to purchase the library film in advance and to study its possibilities. In all probability it would increase the effectiveness of the idea to remove the titles and substitute quotations from grandmother's tale. Grandmother would tell the story during the filming and you can wager that Bobby would furnish the reactions. A possible treatment of the film would run something like this: A shot of Bobby and grandmother and then the title, "And the wicked wolf waited in Little Red Riding Hood's path — ". Then another shot as grandmother finishes speaking, followed by an appropriate excerpt from the library film. However, should the child have older brothers or playmates, the amateur himself could film the tale grandmother is telling, using the other children as actors. It is not necessary to stage an elaborate production. A very simple story will do. The other children may be disguised by the simple expedient of dressing them in grownup clothes and by adding mustaches and side whiskers by means of burnt cork. Place a bridge table in the garden with a cake in the center and set Lady Alice, Lady Effie and Lord Harry around it as if preparing for a magnificent repast. Tom, the pirate, lurks in the [Continued on page 218] Bobby saying his goodnight prayers might end the film D. Warren Boyer