Sociology of film : studies and documents (1946)

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CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS AND THE CINEMA Peter perhaps liked the Russian film Peter the Great best as he is profoundly interested in history. He wanted also to know how the film compared with the 'real' history of Peter the Great. We had read a fairly good children's book about the subject long before the film was shown. After we had seen the film, I read to the boy the relevant pages from a reliable and competent history of Russia. Another point is worth noting. Some weeks ago Peter objected to my wife and myself going out together. As he had never objected to this before, and as he was fairly insistent, I stayed behind, went to bed with him at 8 p.m. and used a psycho-analytical method to find the cause for his anxiety. For this it was : after about two hours I had traced his fright back to the film Of Mice and Men which we had seen together some six months ago. I must admit that I should never have taken the child to see this film, but as I had no idea about the film beforehand my action may at least appear understandable. The child was frightened through seeing the very realistic strangling scene which occurs in this film. He felt relieved through our 'conversation', thanked me, and now again stays by himself when we go out together though this does not happen oftener than once a week. The reader may see how very difficult it is to say in advance what psychological maladjustments may and do arise from films. Let us now consider Hazel. She goes every Saturday to the cinema. Her favourite films are 'thrilling' films which she prefers to 'funny' pictures. She has recently seen with either her grandmother or her father: The Wicked Lady, The Spiral Staircase, and Shock. Hazel obviously likes these pictures. Hazel is undoubtedly a much more 'rationalised' child than Peter. She is not frightened (or rather she says she is not) by the various strangling scenes in The Spiral Staircase. Straightforward murder is all right. What frightens her are 'eerie' episodes, dark corridors, wind and rain. She told me the other day that two days after she had seen The Spiral Staircase she was frightened to be alone in her bedroom, she kept 'thinking' of the dark corridor, but tried then to think of the 'funny' picture which was shown together with The Spiral Staircase. Further inquiry evidenced that the poisoning scene in The Wicked Lady has similarly occupied her Einschlaftraum. A week later Hazel saw the film, Leave Her to Heaven. She did not like it very much as there was only one thrill: when the evil heroine drowned her husband's crippled younger brother. This girl of eleven years perfectly understood the scene when the same heroine threw herself down the stairs in order 'to destroy the baby she was 143