The soul of the moving picture (1924)

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42 The Soul of the Moving Picture The main wheel in the machinery of film art has been found; the technical bases which decide the limits to which the accomplishments and achievements of the motion pictures may hope to go, these are known. Just as brush and colors, or hammer and chisel, each inartistic means in themselves, circumscribe the arts which they aid in creating, and set up a vigorous resistance to an alien or irrelevant aid, just so does the moving picture mechanism become indignant at the intrusion of any and every foreign contrivance or figuration the essential being of which is beyond its natural control. These technical means, by which the manifolding of scenes is made possible and their reproduction stimulating, aid in preserving the naturally perishable art work of the scene or act. The actorscene becomes the pivot of all art consideration. It is from it that all recruiting and recreation radiate; and the fame and glory that attach to the enterprise fall upon those people who delineate the play of the human heart in the visible presence of the spectator. The actor on the legitimate stage is a person — that is, a persona (a usounding-through") ; he is the speaking tube of the poet. His conception of the role he acts is limited, determined, and circum