The New Movie Magazine (Dec 1929-May 1930)

The New Movie Magazine f f m9 f 9 tf fff The famous Albertina Rasch ballet lines up on the beach at Santa Monica, Cal., to have its picture made for The New Movie Magazine. The ballet may be seen in Ramon Novarro's next film, " Devil May Care " Why You Like the Talkies most like a regular play, such as one sees enacted on a stage in actual flesh and blood characters. And the talkie now has advantages which the ordinary drama does not possess. It may well be that some day in the future the talkie will be the best dramatic form possible — whether it be tragedy or comedy — just because of these advantages. The talkie now embodies all the opportunities of the silent screen, such as pictorial effects and greater range of action, and it has, in addition, a chance to employ music as never before attempted. Have you ever observed how quickly you respond to music? And of a sudden at that? Music can make you glad or sad or thoughtful. It can fire your thinking so that you build dream castles. When all is said and done, music is the most stimulating force there is. What would an army do without its stirring marching tunes? How different a church service would be without its organ appeal. Would not life seem rather colorless if popular songs and tunes should cease to be? Hospitals even are beginning to recognize the effect that music may have upon patients in hastening their recovery from operations and disease ! Take the "Mammy" type of song. How does it make you feel? As I heard a man say after hearing Al Jolson sing in "Sonny Boy," "It has pathos in it as well as appeal. It suggests childhood. It is love, respect, sympathy and understanding all mixed in one." The Mammy song really produces such a mind effect. It grips us because it recalls the days when we were tiny tots holding onto mother's apron lest we fall, looking up to her for comfort as well as guidance, crying when she wept, laughing when she was glad. The Mammy song is a kind of grownup lullaby. I mention this kind of song in particular because its appeal is so universal and because it does not appeal unless it is sung just the right way 114 (Contimied from page 31) and with just the right kind of voice. Only a consummate artist like Jolson can do it but how many of you ever had the privilege of hearing him until now — now when the talkie is at your command, or soon will be, in every hamlet in the country? What the talkie can also supply now is real drama that grips. In the old days, I was almost tempted to say, the silent screen had to make up its lack of sound effects by overemphasizing action. That action holds the interest nobody can deny. Yet action alone gets on one's nerves, so to speak. It is tiring. You can't sit on the edge of your seat for any length of time without getting your nerves frayed from exhaustion. The silent movie lacked character portrayal and it lacked it simply because it could not possibly portray a character strong enough by means of action alone. Yet we all know that the greater plays as well as novels have been those with life-like character portrayals. Shakespeare continues to be produced year in and year out, not because he was a great poet, but because his characters talk and act like real human beings. On the silent screen characters often were compelled to act artificially, like "stuffed shirts." One had to guess more or less what the motives were in doing this and that. And the captions! Surely they distracted from the story and interrupted it and often indeed, they became downright annoying. When you can actually hear what characters say, you do not have to fill in and guess. You know why they feel the way they do, why they behave the way they do. They tell you enough to make their actions plausible and logical. In short, in the modern talkie motivation of character is clear and convincing while the characters of the men and women become vital and authentic as well. The principle of suspense has always been a most important mechanism in the building of a play as well as in entertainment in general. If we suspect that something is going to happen but we cannot be certain how, when and where it will happen the suspense of it quickens the interest, rivets the attention and holds us spellbound. Such suspense can be accomplished through action, of course. When we know that the half-sister in "The Green Murder Case" is maneuvering to push her older sister, whom she hates, off the roof and into the icy river below suspense can be built up without a word being said. On the other hand, how much more effective such a scene becomes when we hear the sweet but villainous voice of the half-sister trying with insinuating tones to persuade her victim to come to the roof's edge and thus lure her to her death. Do you recall the sound of the raindrops on the windowpane in that most successful talkie, "Bulldog Drummond?" Could the suspense, the atmosphere, or the stark realism of it have been more effectively registered in the mind through any other medium than a talkie? "Bulldog Drummond" was not nearly as effective when it was a stage play. "Thank goodness, the talkies are here at last!" It is going to mean real actors who know how to talk, how to interpret character, how to build up dramatic situations and climaxes — in a word, who know how to act. It is going to mean also real plays of real structural value so that the more subtle nuances of life — as well as the more obvious and often childish situations as used to be — may be portrayed for the intellectual and emotional enjoyment and instruction of all. The possibilities of the talkies are limitless. They mean a revolution in the drama, not only in this country, but in the entire world. They may constitute the very excitant which all of American art so sorely needs. "Thank eoodness, the talkies are here at last!"