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A POSTSCRIPT AFTER READING THE PROOFS
It may be doubted whether, as the basis of government becomes more and more democratic, the supervision of public entertainments will not become more rather than less exacting and severe,
T. H. S. Escott, England: Its People, and Pursuits, New and Revised Edition, London 1885, p. 550
jVlore than five months have elapsed since the last chapter of this book was written. I have added only a page or two to Chapter VI so as not to delay publication, but I can assure those readers who have followed me so far that the companion volume to this work is nearing completion.
In making a sociological study of the film one must, unfortunately, see those films which, like the Roman circuses, attract the masses — and not merely confine one's interest to those films which Miss Lejeune or Richard Winnington recommends us to see. Amongst such recent mass attractions I should like to mention: The Wicked Lady, Pink String and Sealing Wax, Scarlet Street, The Fallen Angel, The Spiral Staircase, Shock. All these films have a common denominator: they are sordid, play (successfully one presumes) on the lowest instincts of our contemporary masses, and must without exception do immeasurable harm to the growing generation, for the present legislation in this country allows children, if they are accompanied by adults, to see films of this type. The film Shock is perhaps the leading recent film in this category. I regret to say that no British daily paper has written about it as courageously as the American paper P.M. (March 14th, 1946).
These remarks do not imply that I regard films of this type as desirable for adults; quite the contrary. An age which has the paramount task of laying the foundations of a Social Service State must formulate its spiritual priorities and values as clearly as it devises its legislative measures in the social and economic field. All political beliefs fall, in the author's view, into the same category as religious beliefs, in spite of secularised forms. The basic contention of this book is that films provide a technique for shaping
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