Talking pictures : how they are made and how to appreciate them (1937)

Talking Pictures of writing when he described, in page after page of deathless prose, the flight of David Copperfield from his cruel stepfather to the haven of his aunt's arms in her little cottage on the Dover cliffs. But protagonists of the picture form will always consider even more emotionally effective the pictorial montage from the film David Copperfield which expresses Dickens' words in pictorial terms of a little boy lost in a busy city street, a little boy almost run down by a farm wagon, a little boy caught in a fearsome rainstorm. The rapid succession of these events was a pictorial achievement comparable with the written description. To recapitulate, the screen is like the novel in that both have a canvas of unrestricted size. They can roam where and when they choose. But the screen's great advantage is that it can present persons and scenes visually ; the novel can only describe them in words and illustrations. The talking picture has the vitality of verbal conversation which is lacking in the written dialogue of the book. A realization of the differences in form which exist between the various forms of writing and of the drama is the key to the matter of accurate photoplay appreciation. Too many people criticize a motion picture without complete data. They may know the novel and the stage play, but far too many do not know the photoplay. They do not understand why and how it differs from the novel and the stage play. Therefore, to those familiar with the screen, the photoplay criticism of uninformed people seems absurd. Frequently, such criticism is in the same category as [60]