The New York State Exhibitor (1933)

D Page 12 Jul 1 0T 33 YOUR THEATRE A CRITIC SHOULD BE IN THE PARADE SAYS ERIC M. KNIGHT Writing in his capacity as motion picture editor of the "Philadelphia Ledger," Knight maintains that a critic should not wish to be a reformer and that his real duty does not lie in reforming fields. He does insist, however, that a critic should keep trying to educate his audiences. THE LAST THING a critic should wish to be is a reformer. And nine times out of ten, in the cinema field, at least, he finds himself slipping into the role willy-nilly. The real duty of the critic does not lie in reforming fields. He should stand coldly on the dais, receiving what is produced, pronouncing judgments calmly on the quality of the product, condemning the poor, extolling the good. Presumably he also uses his knowledge of his field to ex¬ plain to the layman just why the poor should be condemned, and why the good is worthy of admiration; and perhaps to point out to the workmen in his field the opportunities for further progress. There, I think, the critical area of in¬ fluence should end. But in cinema it doesn’t. There are always the extraneous influences which would have the reviewer step off the judge’s bench and get into the active fight. The reformers would have him wage war against movies that “a child shouldn’t see”; against movies that deal with war; against movies that deal with crime and violence; against movies that have “too much sex.” The critic should keep out of the melee. He may be the sort of person who enjoys fighting, but he must remember that it isn’t his fight to get into. I CANNOT, WITH CONVICTION, wage war for cinema to turn itself into a field which produces “nothing that a child can’t watch.” It’s more important to pro¬ duce pictures that grown-ups can watch. And I am still of the unofficial opinion that moviegoing among children is a parental problem, not a Hollywood one. A child with worth-while parents isn’t going to be allowed to run round recklessly, either among movies, traffic, crowds, parties or any of the other incidental hazards of life. Nor can any but a very self-sufficient critic wage war against “immoral movies.” To do so implies that he is an authority on morals. And it is a brave man, indeed, who 'Will pretenc} to this qualification. Morals are not constant laws that can be recorded or measured. The immoralities of yesterday are the moralities of today and perhaps the immoralities of tomorrow again. The “indecent exposure” of twenty years ago is the same sports garb or swim¬ ming suit of today. What it will be con¬ sidered in twenty years I do not know— perhaps immoral again. When he deals with morals the critic must climb down from the cool sanity of his Olympus and begin speaking of temporary matters. He can say this is vulgar, that is suggestive, the other risque. But then he is giving a personal opinion which doesn’t coincide with that of nine out of ten people and which has no more to do with real criti¬ cism than his emotional disturbances or the status of his blood pressure. THE MOVE TO ELIMINATE “SEX” and “Violence” from motion pictures is as useless an affair as trying to knock down the Great Wall of China with a peashooter. In the first place sex, as a schoolboy wrote, is a pretty important matter. As long as we have normal people living and loving and getting married we’re going to have people interested in it. And the way to overcome any overemphasis of the sex theme on the screen is to make every one understand that it is normal, instead of some sort of an attractive and forbidden sin. Nor are the films of violent deeds the bugbears that many would insinuate. Fiction, opera, history, saga, poetry all have turned for years to glorify the gentleman with strong thews and a fighting spirit. And the world has gone right on rolling along without wanting to legislate all violence out of the reach of poets, chanters, historians, authors, playwrights and librettists. And the screen is going to be more or less a mirror of the tastes and desires of the populace just as are the other fictional methods. The only way to stop sex and violence on the screen is to stop them being a part of life itself. And that, as Harry Lauder used to say, tak’s a bit o’ doin’. I am not upholding the judgment and taste of the gentlemen who make our movies. It is merely that I have seen enough films to know that they work through their evils to their good achieve¬ ments. When the cycle of gangster pic¬ tures was running a year or so ago, it was little use deploring and decrying. It all came to an end exactly at the time that the onlookers decided they had had enough • — not before and not later. THE BEST WAY TO GET good pic¬ tures — and by “good” I do not refer to moral qualifications — is to teach the audi¬ ence how to accept and understand them. And if the critic wishes to climb a white horse and lead a parade, this is a case where he can do so with a more serene countenance. Whether he wants to or not, the reviewer of films will find himself mai’ching in this army at times. True, he often is moved to suspect that it is a small, though stalwart troop which he has joined, but he doesn’t feel out of place. He may not intend to do any crusading even then, but he finds himself doing it. He may not Call actively for more good films, but he does so indirectly by greeting with warmth the ones of adult stature that he does get. He may not openly put on a recruiting sergeant’s badge to swell the ranks of the company, but he is no less an active coercer the moment he begins to explain some advance in technique or some new creative departure. When he explains the new and good, he teaches appreciation of it; when he teaches appreciation of the good, he preaches dis¬ satisfaction with the bad. THUS THE CRITIC, wishing to be a man apart in his cool reviewing stand, continually finds himself becoming the im¬ perfect critic by climbing down among the marchers. It all begins when he cries: “It is new and adult and fascinating — it is progress!” Soon he begins shouting: “Give us more like that!” Sooner or later comes the answer from the producers: “We would like to produce more films of adult content, we would like to express our stories in truly filmic methods, we would like to carry forward the development of tone-film procedure in¬ stead of photographing plays, but we can’t afford it.” The critic soon sees the justice of the explanation. He realizes that in order for the screen to develop under its present production method there must be created a sufficiently large body of moviewatchers who will support films that are advanced in subject and in treatment. So he begins recruiting the necessary adultminded audiences. AND THUS HE LOSES his detached attitude, he leaves behind the cool cloisters of impartiality and becomes an agitator. Not only does he ride a horse in the parade, but he buckles on a shield and sword and begins taking hefty wallops at that which would stop the march of his own particular army. Now whether all this is good or bad, I don’t know. I merely know it exists. I know that I frequently leave behind the cool, critical phrases and begin shouting fighting words. And often I look around suddenly and wonder what on earth I am doing so far away from my two-by-four throne. The only excuse I have is that perfect criticism can’t exist in cinema yet. I sup¬ pose the only moral to all this is that if the film critic can’t keep out of parades, at least he should be fairly particular about the ones he gets into.