Picture-Play Magazine (Sep 1926 - Feb 1927)

r'90 1 The Lure of the Sure Fire The old stuff in the movies will never age, so long as you continue to enjoy it. By Malcolm H. Oettinger THESE caviar sandwiches are an very well," said Old-timer, "but give me some of the doughnuts and. coffee that mother used to make!" "And as for these problem plays by these Scandi. navians and Swedes," rejoined Equally Old-time Friend, "they're all right for those people who enjoy them, but for me — the good old melodrama, with the blondined heroine and the silk-hatted villain who passes away in act four to the sound of cheering !" ' "With the orchestra playing "Dixie,' " added Oldtimer, thoughtfully. "You bet — and with the electrician getting the purple bunch light all ready for the last tender scene between the hero and the little blonde, reunited," sighed Friend. "Every time!" responded Old-timer, warmly. "The old stuff is best." "I'll say so!" averred Friend. And that's exactly the way it is. The above fragment might well be a verbatim report of a conversation at almost any gathering where the old-timers discuss the new drama, with its sublimation of bedrooms, crooks, and lingerie. The old-timers love to hark back to those rosemary -tinted days when the play's climax came at the stroke of ten thirty, at what time the big scenic effect flashed before the audience, depicting Harold Hathaz^ay crossing the Rocky Gorge hand over hand, via rope, to save the gal from the clutches of the frock-coated villain, and to gain a well-merited salvo of applause. Those were the days ! And no one remembers more accurately than the producers of present-day motion pictures what effects thrilled the spectators, what lines tapped the tear ducts, what situations evoked the deep-seated chuckle, and what action caused a gasp of astonishment. Most of the good old stuff has been and is being preserved for posterity by the film makers of 1926 A. D. The psychology of the thing is simple. The new ideas in the drama, argues the photoplay producer, are all right for some one else to dabble with, but his particular aim in life is to turn out pictures that will turn 'em away at the box office. His target is the "Standing Room Only" sign, and he knows that the surest way to effect such results is to repeat, in slightlv different form, the successes that have already been put across to the satisfaction of public and producer alike. So he makes a Western, advertises it as a second "Covered Wagon," and watches the reports come in from Tuscaloosa, Seattle, Emporia, and Jacksonville. "Give us more like this!" "Packed houses despite rain!" "Sure-fire hit!" "More like this!" And, beaming at these messages, our producer forthwith turns to his desk phone, calls up his scenario chief and says, "Do a war story that we can compare with 'The Big Parade.' " Six months later, a similar batch of telegrams will come flooding in. Is it surprising to you that he keeps on producing the old stuff? Do you wonder that he continues to celluloid sure-fire stories? You do not ! Like Peter Pan, there are myriad situations in shadowland that will never grow old — that will never fail to thrill, or shock, or amuse, or sadden. There are a hundred and one sure-fire bits of action that are, as the name indicates, certain in effect. They, like Dcadivood Dick, never miss. It would be impossible to enumerate a third of the devices in this category of what we have capriciously termed Peter Pan-tomimes, but it is easy to suggest a few that will, in turn, bring to the mind of the reader numerous others. Consider, par example, the good old Western flickerplay, with its sheriff of the drooping mustache, and its sparkling-eyed hero, usually the road agent. Think back to the scenes you're almost certain to see every time. There's the old sure-fire' barroom meeting of road agent and sheriff, wherein the former smiles at the latter and asks if he's caught his man, and the arm of the law eyes the hero piercinglv and responds. "Not yet, but I'm goin' to soon !" Then there's the chase, in the course of which the escaping good-bad man eludes the close-pressing posse by swinging off of his horse into the limbs of an opportune roadside tree. Perhaps he turns his horse off into a stream, hiding his retreat, to the utter baffling of the pursuers. And then, the love interest ! Was there ever a Y\ extern drammer that didn't picture the bandit awkwardly edging closer to the little crinolined ingenue? Oh, well, you say with a wicked sneer, that was the case years ago, when the two-reelers and split-reels were the vogue. But I hasten to inform you to the contrary. The above Western folklore is culled from modern successes. It's the type of thing that always has and always will receive popular acclaim. Comedy depends, for its laughs, almost exclusively upon what is usually termed hokum. And because a comedy is an attempt at continuous laughter as a rule, it is also an example of continuous hokum. "Hokum" is merely the picture player's patois for "sure-fire stuff." When the funny man brushes his boots, and then applies the same brush to his hair, that's hokum. Or when the same funny man dashes toward the nearest lake with flames darting from the hinterland of his pants, that's hokum. Or when some one falls down a well, and the funny man turns the handle, bringing the dripping victim almost to the top, only to be attracted by a passing bathing beauty, with a sudden release of the handle and a corresponding splash resulting, that 's hokum. You see, the ways of hokum are infinite. Time cannot wither, nor custom stale, its infinite variety. In a slapstick duello, when one comic shoots another in the midway of his pantaloons, rear view, or when he kicks him in the same territory, he is perpetrating hokum. Likewise, when two figures stoop to pick up the same object, and bump with sufficient force to topple each other over, the act is pure hokum. Hokum, Buster Keaton once told me, is a gag that always goes. He might have added that the better the gag, the longer it goes. The ones already mentioned saw duty in the Ark, to the great amusement of Father Noah and all the younger Noahs. Any director will tell you it's sure fire to have the lovers draw a shade in front of the camera, curtaining their kiss, or silhouetting it, just as it's sure fire to introduce the heroine cooing to her clove or canary or parrot. And the public always laugh at the rube storekeeper who eyes the stove-warming local constabule as he eats the crackers on the counter, just as they always thrill at seeing the hero's auto shoot past the Twentieth Continued on page 103