much to spare on one side of it or the other. So, it may be seen, if he
isn't a good judge of tempo he is liable to find himself in the very
deuce of a mix when he comes to cut and edit his episodes. If he has
allowed too much film for a certain incident there usually isn't much to
do but cut the entire incident out and cover the hole with a subtitle.
If, by any chance, he has not allowed enough space for his action, the
episode appears hurried, awkward, jumbled, hard to follow. And if he has
slowed some scenes down a bit so that he will have the proper footage
when it comes to this cutting and editing, his audiences will jump on
him for trying to “pad out” the picture.
So, difficult as is the task that confronts the director of the five
reel dramatic or humorous subject, the task that confronts the director
of the serial must needs be set down as more difficult still. The only
reason why the serial director is not given greater position in this
volume is that the demands of his audiences and the limitations of his
footage, permit him to attempt little that is regarded in a serious way
by audiences of taste and discrimination.
The average feature picture can be summed up on its merits on the day
that it is shown but, “features may come and features may go, but
serials run on forever” and consequently no one can attempt to sum up a
serial in one sitting.
CHAPTER XV
THE METHOD OF THOMAS H. INCE
_A survey of the Ince method of production with
due realization of the fact that he stakes
everything on the picture continuity.—Proof of
his success and a few of the reasons for it
with an anecdote about a certain director who
wouldn't play ball with Mr. Ince_
CHAPTER XV
As a general rule there is no love lost between directors and scenario
writers. This is particularly the case in the big producing companies
where directors work more or less on a schedule, an elastic schedule to
be sure, but nevertheless a schedule. In these companies a director
seldom has a chance to co-operate with the scenario writer on the
construction of a continuity. Sometimes he has complaints on it which
are never taken up and discussed due to lack of time. As a result the
director blames the scenario writer for the mistakes in the finished
picture.
With the case of the directors who have proven themselves in an artistic
way, it will be found that the majority of them have much to say about
the handling of their stories in continuity form. They either actually
co-operate on the writing of the continuity from which they are to work
or they claim to discard continuities altogether and work from notes, a
brief synopsis or—from the head.
Both the De Milles have much to say about the writing of continuities
from which they work. As a consequence when it comes to the actual task
of directing they are dealing with their own ideas. It has been related
how D. W. Griffith prefers to work without a continuity and his reasons
therefore. Frank Borzage is a champion for the continuity synopsis, a
running account of the plot, undivided into scenes. Many other directors
prefer this method, dividing their pictures into the desired and natural
number of scenes during actual work. All such directors claim that to
follow a scene numbered continuity through directly results in a
mechanical picture. Like the De Milles they claim that to produce such a
picture well, they must also have a hand in the writing of the
mechanical continuity.
[Illustration:
THOMAS H. INCE WATCHING ONE OF HIS COMPANIES AT WORK WHILE THE CAMERAS
CLICK MERRILY ABOVE
]
[Illustration:
THE HANDLING OF A GIANT MEGAPHONE IS ONE OF THE FIRST THINGS A
DIRECTOR LEARNS. OBSERVE THOMAS H. INCE'S SKILL
]
On the face of it the arguments of these directors seem sound. But it is
easy enough to take the other side of the question and riddle the
arguments completely. The stand can be taken that the motion picture
director performs no other functions than those performed by the stage
director. And many and many a stage director has turned out productions
of artistic worth by merely following the author's manuscript. Few stage
directors decline to direct a Shakespearean production for the reason
that they didn't have a hand in the writing of the play.
Which brings up the methods employed by Thomas H. Ince, probably the
most successful producing-director in the entire field of motion
pictures. Mr. Ince is at the head of a number of producing units. He has
a certain number of directors making pictures for him. Over the work of
these men he exercises an actual supervision. And when a director works
for Mr. Ince he does what Mr. Ince tells him to do.
Mr. Ince is one of the veterans of the picture producing craft. He has
developed more stars, perhaps, than any other man in the field today.
William S. Hart, Charles Ray, Dorothy Dalton and Louise Glaum are the
brightest of those he has brought out. And the secret of Thomas H.
Ince's greatness, whether he admits it himself or not, is the minute
attention he pays to the matter of preparing the continuities of the
pictures from which his directors work.
Probably Mr. Ince pays more attention to this preparation of a
continuity than does any other producer. In his opinion the greater part
of the work of producing a picture has been completed when the
continuity is in final shape to hand to the director.
Equipped with the power of visualization to a remarkable degree Mr. Ince
and his production manager thoroughly scrutinize the continuity when it
is handed them by a member of the scenario department. Every point in
the story, and every point in its development at the hands of the
continuity writer is discussed. As a rule when the continuity is
returned to its author there are a number of alterations and changes to
be made. And when these are made Mr. Ince goes over the script again.
Sometimes this interchange of ideas is carried on between Mr. Ince and
his scenario department for six or eight times before the continuity is
in final shape for the director.
Then when the director finally does receive the manuscript he finds some
such order as this stamped across its face: “Produce this exactly as
written!” This, however, is not the arbitrary demand of an autocrat. If
the director sees a place where a change will work some good to the
story he has the privilege of placing the matter before Mr. Ince
himself. But for the most part the Ince continuities are so thoroughly
gone over before placing them in the hands of the directors that few if
any changes for the better suggest themselves.
Therefore when the Ince director starts to work on the picture he is
carrying out the ideas of the continuity writer and his chief to the
most minute detail. His is the business of directing the picture, not of
creating it in the broadest sense of the words.
Now according to other directors who insist that such a method of
procedure produces mechanical results, is responsible for a work lacking
in inspiration and all the finer qualities that go to make a picture,
and degrades the director into the position of a mere clerk, Mr. Ince's
pictures would be the worst the art has to offer. The fact that they are
the most consistently meritorious that the art has to offer would seem
to refute the arguments brought up by these others completely.
So what is the answer? Griffith produces good pictures after his method.
Borzage and a number of others produce good pictures after the same
methods, or methods practically the same. And Mr. Ince, hands his
director a continuity divided strictly into scenes, each camera angle is
numbered and for a purpose, for the director to go out and make all
these camera angles, these scenes, just as Mr. Ince ordered him to.
The answer is, after all, quite simple. Mr. Ince has capabilities
matched by no other director in the producing art. One of his
capabilities may be matched here and there but never all of them by
another individual. Thus Mr. Ince and his scenario department are the
creators of Ince pictures. The directors he employs carry out his ideas.
And these directors, while the above argument may prove them mere
automatons, are in reality skilled men, artists for the most part,
versed in all the niceties of picture producing. The fact that the
majority of them, when they have left Mr. Ince's fold, have succeeded on
their own separate accounts, is proof of that.
The matter, therefore, simmers down to this simple problem. Can a
producing organization turn out better pictures than an individual
director? The solution of the problem is in the following qualified
statement: Yes, when the producing organization is headed by Thomas H.
Ince.
Mr. Ince's qualifications for such leadership are manifold. To begin
with, he is, naturally, a born leader of men. If chance had led him into
the business world instead of the art of motion picture producing he
might well be a bank director or a railroad official. He would know his
business thoroughly whatever it was and then would proceed with the
utmost confidence in his own knowledge. Of course he would make mistakes
even as he has made some few mistakes in picture producing but more
often the reverse from mistakes would be the case.
Anyone familiar with Mr. Ince will talk for hours on his magnetic
personality. It is a personality that few, if any, seem able to resist.
Thus he is able to give orders and have them carried out to the letter
without giving offense. It seems that giving orders without accompanying
them by a modicum of offense is a pretty hard thing to do. Dozens of men
in the craft of picture producing would trade almost anything they've
got for this ability of Mr. Ince's.
On top of these qualities, invaluable from whatever angle of business or
art that they are approached is Mr. Ince's thorough knowledge of making
pictures. This knowledge is not confined to one department of
production, nor does he specialize in a single department of production.
He is conversant with every department and is able to consider each one
in its proper light, to value it properly, particularly with its
relation to the others.
Still there are the individualists that oppose Mr. Ince and belittle his
methods. He doesn't bother about them often as he employs directors who
are willing to work into his scheme of production and these for the most
part have been richly rewarded.
There is an interesting story in connection with one individualistic
director, whose name shall be kept a secret for his own sake, and the
Ince organization. It appears that Mr. Ince had signed this director to
a contract without inquiring into his willingness to work along the
prescribed Ince lines.
The continuity of a comedy-drama was handed him shortly after his
arrival at the studio and he was told that everything was in readiness
for him to begin work.
The director read the continuity and addressed himself to Mr. Ince
somewhat as follows: “You don't expect me to produce this, do you? Why
this continuity is so bad that it couldn't possibly turn out to be a
good picture. I won't make it!”
Mr. Ince, with the director's name fastened on the end of a contract, is
alleged to have replied with a certain degree of forcefulness: “You will
produce it.”
The argument went back and forth. The director wanted to work but he
didn't want to work in the Ince manner. Mr. Ince's pride and temper were
undoubtedly stirred and he insisted that the director produce the
picture along the lines prescribed by him.
Finally an agreement was reached. The director condescended to produce
the picture on condition that when it was produced his name was to be
left off it as director. Mr. Ince acceded to this demand.
To do the director credit he then went about his work sincerely. Mr.
Ince watched him carefully and realized that he was doing his best,
though still believing the cause was hopeless. The director, when he
finished work, was dismissed from whatever further terms were contained
in the contract.
And so the picture was put before the public without the individualistic
director's name upon it. It was one of the most successful pictures ever
released. It was an irresistible comedy-drama and everyone who saw it
fairly revelled in it.
The director when he realized how he had talked himself out of credit
for one of the art's best pictures must have fretted and fumed
considerably. Equally galling must have been the large advertising bills
he received for pointing out the fact to the motion picture trade in
large announcements that he had directed the picture. For Mr. Ince had
lived up to the agreement to the letter. He had not only left the
director's name off the picture but had removed it from all advertising
as well.
Mr. Ince had his little joke.
And probably the director doesn't care much now anyway. He is a success
with another company and is still saying that he can't make good
pictures from a continuity on which he didn't work himself.
CHAPTER XVI
DIRECTORS SCHOOLED BY INCE
_A partial list of directors schooled under
Thomas H. Ince who have made successes as
individualists elsewhere and who, because of
their successes, are actual refutations of the
argument that Mr. Ince turns out mere picture
mechanics and carpenters, not artistic creators_
[Illustration:
THOMAS H. INCE, AMONG HIS OTHER ACCOMPLISHMENTS, CAN SHOW AN ACTOR HOW
TO PERFORM IN A SCENE AND OFTEN DOES
]
[Illustration:
MARY PICKFORD'S VERSION OF “LITTLE LORD FAUNTLEROY” IS A CREDITABLE
VERSION OF THE FAMOUS STORY. THE ATMOSPHERE COMMUNICATED TO THE
VARIOUS SCENES BY THE DIRECTOR, PLAYED AN IMPORTANT PART IN THE
PICTURE'S SUCCESS
]
CHAPTER XVI
Those who cry down the methods employed by Thomas H. Ince with respect
to the directors who work in his studio often state that the Ince school
of directing snuffs out any original ideas that a director may possess
and makes him a mere picture mechanic, capable only of turning out
mechanical and uninteresting pictures.
And lest it be thought that sufficient proof hasn't been offered to
counteract this argument some few of the directors who started under the
early Ince regime and left to make their marks as individualists
elsewhere are mentioned here.
There is Reginald Barker, long on the Ince staff, who until recently was
employed at the Goldwyn studios and who was entrusted with the direction
of many of their most important stories and stars. The facts and records
point to only one conclusion, that Mr. Barker has directed some of the
most successful pictures made by the Goldwyn company and is one of the
most reliable men in the field today.
There is Fred Niblo who after a short session at the Ince studio turned
his energy elsewhere. Mr. Niblo happens to be the man who directed
Douglas Fairbanks in the highly successful “Three Musketeers.” No one,
within or without the field of motion pictures, has once stated that
“The Three Musketeers” appears to be the work of an automaton.
There is R. William Neill, who, since he left the Ince school some
several years ago has been hard put to it to accept all the positions he
has had offered him. Other picture producers are not in the habit of
seeking a man to fill the responsible position of director when he can
only carry out the definite orders of his superior.
There is Jerome Storm who while with the Ince organization made a big
name for himself by directing many of the pictures in which Charles Ray
appeared. Mr. Storm left Mr. Ince when Mr. Ray left him. Mr. Storm
directed Mr. Ray's first independent picture. Mr. Ray, since he has been
directing his own pictures, shows sadly the lack of Mr. Storm's guiding
hand. And Mr. Storm has had various positions since leaving Mr. Ray—in
fact, has had quite as many as he could well take care of.
There is Victor Shertzinger who while with Mr. Ince also made some very
good Charles Ray pictures. With the Goldwyn company he made an enviable
reputation for himself as a director of light comedy and proved more
successful in handling Mabel Normand than any other director with the
sole exception of Mack Sennett himself. Mr. Shertzinger is now at the
head of his own producing company. A difficult post for a man to achieve
who is no more than a mere mechanic taking orders from a producing
genius such as Mr. Ince!
There is Lambert Hillyer, who with this writing is back with Mr. Ince
after several years in the service of William S. Hart, directing and
writing the majority of that star's pictures. Mr. Hart would hardly pick
a mechanical nincompoop to direct his screen efforts which are
considerably important both to Mr. Hart and the public at large.
There is Frank Borzage himself who was with Mr. Ince a long time as an
actor and who had ample opportunity to absorb his system of directing.
And Mr. Borzage, as has been previously stated, is quite a worthy
director.
There is Roland Lee, one of the younger directors, developed by Mr. Ince
who only recently left him and who immediately made a name for himself
directing some Hobart Bosworth pictures and who at this writing is with
the Goldwyn company handling the directorial end of some of that
company's most important pictures.
This is an array of directors rather difficult to match. And if it was
tried to match it from a list of directors turned out by any other
producing-director or any other producing organization, the poor fellow
who tried would find himself in for a life's job.
To work in the Ince school of directing is, indeed, the luckiest thing
that can befall a director. Instead of making him an insignificant
employe, merely carrying out the work mapped out by the man higher up,
it teaches him thoroughly all branches of picture directing so that when
he strikes out for himself he is far better able to approach the
excellence achieved by his former superior than he would be without such
schooling.
CHAPTER XVII
WHO CREATES A PICTURE?
_Wherein it is shown that the continuity writer
and not the director is the actual creator of
the motion picture in its motion picture
form.—Proof is offered by the directors
themselves who, perhaps unwittingly, have
previously shown that the continuity writer is
the beginning of everything in the studio_
CHAPTER XVII
So much discussion has been set down in these pages regarding the
results obtained when a director prepares his own continuity or when he
works without a continuity in his hand; and it has been explained that a
large number of directors produce the best results when they collaborate
with their continuity writers, that the question naturally arises as to
who is the actual creator of the motion pictures seen on the theatre
screens. Is the director the creator? Or is the continuity writer the
creator?
This is a question that can't be answered without giving immeasurable
offense to the one group of artists or the other. Every director will
publicly announce that he and his fellows are the creators. And every
continuity writer will announce the same thing. Having had considerable
experience in the continuity line and never having directed a picture, I
will probably be accused of bias when I side with the writing men.
However, the facts of the case seem to point solely to the conclusion
that the writers are the creators. The very directors who decline to
follow a written continuity in their work give particular significance
to this statement.
It has been shown that D. W. Griffith and a number of his lesser
disciples decline to use a continuity on the ground that it cramps their
originality. They can't make a good picture following another man's
continuity. What better answer could be found than that in answer of the
question, “Who is the creator of a picture?”
Both the De Milles are frank with the statement that they work long and
arduously over the preparation of their continuities. Then there is
Thomas H. Ince's method which, as explained, stresses the importance of
the continuity above all else. It appears to be plain, therefore, that
the continuity is generally regarded as the beginning of everything with
respect to the motion picture. Of course, the original story comes first
of all and is vastly the most important matter for consideration. But
the original, as a general rule, is not a picture story. From the
original story the continuity writer creates the picture.
The continuity writer thinks in pictures. If he is efficient he is able
to visualize his work as he goes along. When he has finished his task he
has a completed picture in his mind. And if his continuity is a perfect
work he has a completed picture on paper. And, still further, if the
director is capable of visualizing, he discerns this completed picture
that lies before him on paper and proceeds to transfer it to the
celluloid.
The man who carries out the plans for the construction of a giant
building or of a subway, the man who does the actual building of a great
ship or the man who directs a picture, are not the creators of their
work. The creators are the men who draw up the plans.
The reason why directors claim that they can't get the best results
working with another man's continuity is that they realize that
directing has its limitations. To actually create they must invade the
field of creation. And so the Griffiths and the De Milles invade the
continuity writers' field and do creating on their own accounts. And
some of them, of course, are creators of excellence.
Then, these matters granted, why bother about the continuity writer, it
may be asked. Without going to the defense of these greatly abused
fellows it may be emphatically stated that without the continuity writer
the directors would find their work greatly deteriorating. In the field
of production today there are certain directors who insist on doing
their own continuities, who refuse even the slightest assistance or
suggestion from an outside source. Many of these men grow “stale” in
their work and turn out uninspired and mechanical pictures. They “live”
with a picture too long. They get to know it so well that they slight
it. They know it so well that they think everyone else is on the same
familiar footing with it. They see it through their own eyes only and
they see it through colored glasses that obligingly obliterate all its
faults and intensify its merits. These men won't let anyone touch one of
their pictures in any process of production. They even insist on doing
the actual cutting and editing of the film and the writing of the
subtitles. Their work is, as a rule, artless, tedious to watch and flat
in the majority of effects striven for.
This condemnation of the man who combines both the arts of writing for
the screen and directing is not to be taken without exception. The rule
is like every other rule and wouldn't be a rule unless there were here
and there an exception to it.
So, instead of a creator the motion picture director really finds
himself in the same position occupied by the man who sets out to
translate a book from one language into another. The work has already
been created and lies before him needing only his deft touch to recreate
it through a different medium than type. Recreate seems to be the proper
word. Deprived of the privilege of calling himself a creator, a director
can at last call himself a recreator.
And when a director proceeds to translate a work of his own from type to
picture form he is filling both positions. However, the fact that he is
creating in one of his capacities, doesn't mean that he is creating in
the other as well.
This sudden depriving of the director of all award in the creation of a
motion picture and handing it to the screen writer may not seem at all
just. There are directors who will say that such a claim is ridiculous,
who will say that a continuity writer cannot possibly be the creator of
a picture because he doesn't know the exact topography of the exterior
location or setting to be used as background for the scene, who will say
that there are hundreds of times when little pieces of “business”
suggest themselves on the moment to the director.
[Illustration:
THE JEWISH TYPES IN FRANK BORZAGE'S “HUMORESQUE” HAVE BECOME WORLD
RENOWNED
]
[Illustration:
“DISRAELI,” DIRECTED BY HENRY KOLKER, IS ONE OF THE MOST PERFECTLY
MADE PICTURES FROM THE STANDPOINT OF THE PRODUCING ART
]
These and dozens of other arguments will be advanced to riddle the
statement that the continuity writer is the creator. But the statement
will still stand as a fact. The slight changes necessitated when an
exterior location presents some unusual topography never seriously
change the plot of the picture. The business introduced, if it is good
business, enriches the plot so much the more. Then if the director
wishes he may designate himself as a decorator in addition to a
recreator.
But despite all these words that seem to detract from the glory of the
director, his work remains a high art, tremendous and difficult to
master. His task of translating from the printed page to the strips of
film is no child's play by any manner of means. To accomplish this work
he must bring into play all his talents, his experience, his
level-headedness, his judgment of story values, his ability to handle
people, his knowledge of dramatic construction and so on and so forth.
If he hasn't many talents he is liable to keenly feel the lack of them
before he has progressed far on his work.
The fact that the average director refers to his continuity or rather
somebody else's continuity to guide him is no reflection on his own
ability. It produces proper balance in the work of picture making and
the director knows it. He knows too that the art of picture making is no
exception to the old rule that two heads are better than one.
The best scheme of things and one which is followed in many studios
today is to have a director and a continuity writer work hand in hand
not only on the construction of the picture story but also on the
director's end of it—the writer acting in the capacity of supervisor and
advisor to the director. This method of procedure has produced some of
the best pictures recently made.
It would be ideal if human nature in general didn't contain those
qualities which make armies and navies necessary and which make cats and
dogs fight.
CHAPTER XVIII
MUSIC IN PICTURE PRODUCTION
_The value of music in inspiring the proper mood
in a company of players.—An argument in favor of
this aide to the director and the recitation of
an occasion where a director went mad_
CHAPTER XVIII
Many directors use music to inspire from their actors and actresses the
best performances. The idea is plausible and often productive of the
desired results. Often, too, it is carried to extremes. There is one
quite famous star who needs “Hearts and Flowers” rendered in the slowest
pitch of melancholy, to satisfactorily walk across a setting. She
doesn't register any deep emotion in this instance either, unless
walking can be so termed.
It was some time in the year 1914 that music was discovered as one of
the director's chief aides. A large ballroom scene was being
photographed at the old Thanhauser studio in New Rochelle. Invitations
were sent to members of the press to attend and watch the work. A rare
innovation was promised. The innovation turned out to be the fact that
the ballroom dancers actually danced to the strains of an orchestra!
Previously picture dancers had been forced to rely on their own sense of
rhythm.
Since then musicians have grown to be almost as vital in picture making
as the cameraman or the actors themselves. At the studios in the early
morning appear almost as many men carrying violin cases as there are
with makeup boxes.
The idea isn't at all as far-fetched as it may sound. Music, more than
all the advice and coaching that a director may give his company, serves
to cast them in the proper mood for a scene. National folk dances and
folk songs offer proof of this. It is a familiar sight to see members of
Latin and Slavic nations, stirred to the very depths of their souls by
the familiar notes of some ancient folk song or dance. It will inspire
them to forget their surroundings and break into abandoned action.
Thus, when an actor or an actress is called upon to do a particularly
pathetic and emotional scene upon the screen, the proper accompaniment
from musicians assists the player in striking the right note in the
performance. There are comedians, too, who employ musical inspiration.
However, when they are playing a burlesque scene they often call for the
slow, tearful music that is used for the serious scene. It gives them a
better slant on the burlesque element in the scene.
Probably the director first conceived the idea of using music in the
making of his pictures from the fact that it is used to such great
success in the presentation of the completed picture to the public.
Sometimes the difference in effect in seeing a picture in the bare
projection room of a studio and then watching it shown in a theatre to a
full orchestral accompaniment is startling. So, rightly argued the
director, if music can be employed to such benefit in the exhibition of
a picture, it can be employed to equal benefit in the production of it.
In a studio where two or three companies are working at the same time it
must be confessed that the effect of the various orchestras is more or
less confusing. The actors and actresses would be doing quite the right
thing if they went altogether insane. I was in a large studio in the
west only recently when a cabaret scene was being filmed on one set to
the wildest of jazz tunes. Immediately to one side of it there was a
subduedly lighted church scene, wherein hero and heroine were, for
purposes of pictures, going through the marriage ceremony. The man who
was playing the little melodion for this scene was having a furious time
trying to make himself heard above the ten piece jazz band only a few
feet away.
The director of the church scene finally decided to await the time when
the director of the cabaret scene paused between “takes” of his picture.
He thought he had hit the right moment and was half way through his
quiet marriage when “zim-boom-bang” the jazzers were at it again.
The last I saw of the poor church director he was learning the latest
dance steps from the actor who played the minister.
Yes, many motion picture directors turn gray prematurely.
CHAPTER XIX
JUST SUPPOSE
_Do you actually know what you could be up
against if tomorrow you were given the
opportunity to direct a picture? What do you
know about light, camera angles, makeup,
exits and entrances? Could you successfully
dominate the stage before a company of wise
professionals?_
CHAPTER XIX
Practically anyone who has given any thought, whether serious or not, to
picture production, thinks deep down in his heart that he could direct
just as well if not better than the fellows that are directing. In like
manner, when his fancy turns in the direction of writing for the screen,
he is certain that he could write a better photoplay than the “creatures
of luck” who are writing photoplays. This, of course, is human nature
and can never be changed.
But just suppose, for the sake of argument, that you reader (you
representing in this instance one of those everyones who knows he can
direct as well if not better than the next fellow); just suppose you are
given your opportunity to direct. Just suppose that tomorrow morning you
are to start your first picture. You have read your continuity over and
again, you have assembled your cast, you have seen to it that the first
setting constructed in the studio is to your liking. Tomorrow you begin
work on actual production.
You arrive at the studio at nine o'clock (for directors have to keep
hours like everyone else, you know) and you step briskly out of your
limousine and proceed to your office, where, after divesting yourself of
outer garments, you read again the scenes you are to begin work upon.
Following this you step briskly upon the studio stage and find your
company waiting for you (providing, of course, that the star hasn't
decided to become temperamental and be an hour late the first morning).
[Illustration:
A RACE TRACK SCENE IN “TURN TO THE RIGHT,” DIRECTED BY REX INGRAM
REX INGRAM DIRECTING A “BIT” OF “THE FOUR HORSEMEN.” THE WHITE CANVAS
SQUARE IS A REFLECTOR, USED IN EXTERIOR SCENES TO GIVE THE PLAYERS
THE FULL BENEFIT OF THE SUNLIGHT
]
[Illustration:
THOMAS MEIGHAN AND “ALL HANDS AND FEET” IN THE SCENE FROM “CAPPY
RICKS” WHEREIN THE LATTER PROFESSED HIS IGNORANCE OF THE CORRECT
MANNER IN WHICH TO FALL DOWN
]
You glance over the setting to see whether everything is ship-shape and
in readiness. Perhaps it is and perhaps it isn't. Perhaps dust has
accumulated on the library table over night and perhaps again the
property boy has forgotten to remove it. (Must a director bother about
such little details? Indeed, the director must).
The dust removed you turn your attention to the lights. Are the “banks”
in the right place? (Of course, you know that a “bank” is the moving
mass of light that is flooded in from the side of the setting). You go
into consultation with the cameraman and the chief electrician to
determine whether they are in the right place or not. And you mustn't
betray any ignorance about the placing of the lights to these men. If
you do your standing with them begins diminishing even before you have
begun work. Well, the banks are all right. So are the overheads. And the
sunlight arc. And are you going to use any of the smaller “spots” to
offset your star to the best advantage? These must also be in the right
place.
You have made sure then that everything is well with the lights.
Thereupon you turn your attention to the camera. The cameraman has been
told from what angle you are going to “shoot” the scene first and has
“set up” his machine according to his own likes. You study the angle and
you visualize just how the scene will look on the film, taken from this
angle. You may want the camera a little closer or a little farther away
and so you go into conference with the cameraman and after considerable
argument you win your point and the camera is moved. This, of course,
necessitates a slight change in the position of the lights again which,
of course, you attend to.
Then finally you come to the consideration of the players themselves.
You know all about makeup, of course, and you examine the players
closely to see whether they know all about it too. Is this fellow who is
playing the butler made up properly? Is this girl who is to do the “bit”
of the maid all right? No, you decide, she has too much rouge on her
lips and not enough mascara about the eyes. You politely inform her of
her mistake and beg her to hurry to her dressing room and alter her
countenance.
For this interference the maid looks daggers at you and departs. The
star strolls restlessly about and looks at you as if to say, “Well, when
are you going to begin, anyway?” You look at the union stage hands and
realize that while they are standing around here grinning at you they
are getting paid for it every minute and their pay is being charged up
against your work. And you haven't even started yet and here it is
almost eleven o'clock! Still you mustn't become obviously flustered. If
you did the whole company would give you a laugh, closely approaching
the justly celebrated razz-berry.
The maid returns. She is ready at last so are the others. Now you begin
a rehearsal. Your scene calls for the following action.
—maid enters library door and crosses down to telephone. She
answers phone. Butler pokes head in door and listens intently as
she talks over phone. He is startled out of his position by the
appearance of the master of the house back of him. He steps into
the room and holds the door open for his master. The maid,
realizing that she isn't alone, drops the telephone in
confusion, and confronts the master. She makes apologies and
exits, followed by the butler while the master of the house
looks after her in a quandary.
You explain the parts to the butler and the maid who perhaps are not
familiar with the scene. Then you do start. And like as not the first
rehearsal will appear impossible to your well-trained eye. The maid and
the butler don't act properly. You call a halt in the middle of a scene
and explain matters thoroughly to them. The star, playing the master of
the house, thinks that you might have explained all this before and
plainly shows that state of mind. He is so capable in expressing his
innermost thoughts that your sole consolation is the happy thought that
he is a fine actor and won't need much direction.
Finally the rehearsal runs smoothly. You then order “lights” and up they
all go. And then you order “camera” and your cameraman starts grinding.
And then you order “action” and the players start through the scene,
every motion of theirs recorded by the all-seeing eye of the camera. To
you, the director, standing there watching and prompting now and again,
every little fault of the players, every bit of wasted motion, every
insignificant gesture, stands out in the shape of a tremendous eyesore.
You know they are doing what you told them but still you tell yourself
it could be much better. At length you tell the cameraman to stop in the
middle of the scene. The players look up at you as if to say, “Well,
what now!” and you step forward and try to explain with the utmost of
tact that the maid didn't handle the telephone properly and that the
butler didn't listen eagerly enough.
So, despite their frowns, you proceed with the scene again. And this
time it is the star who doesn't suit you. He doesn't seem to stop short
enough when he comes to the door and he doesn't seem to regard the maid
suspiciously enough when she confronts him guiltily. You explain
matters, therefore, to the star. Now this star of yours may be a
particularly conceited fellow. He may sincerely believe too that he is
playing the part as well as it possibly could be played. He listens with
something approaching a deaf ear to your patient explanations as to how
the part should be played.
And then he flabbergasts you with this remark, “Well, I am doing it the
best way I can and I don't get what you mean at all. Suppose you go
through the scene for me!” You try to think quickly and wonder what
Cecil De Mille or somebody else who doesn't believe in showing a player
“how” would act under the circumstances. You are lost and the only
course for you to take is to show the star how you think the scene ought
to be played.
But can you act? Did you ever try? No matter, you've got to now. So you
make a wild stab at the part. Everyone, you know, is standing around
watching you. Some actors from another picture may have strolled over to
watch you. They linger when they discover that you are to give an
exhibition of acting. You rather have the idea that the entire studio
force is out there watching you—and laughing at you.
Following your performance you take the star aside and ask him whether
he got the idea. If he is in a condescending mood by that time he may
say, “yes,” and so you start the scene again. And now the trouble is
that you are inclined to believe that anything your players do is the
right thing. You are still nervous from the exhibit you just made of
yourself and trying hard not to display the symptoms of it to everyone
around you.
So you summon up all your courage and direct that scene with all your
might and main. It's just got to be good. And when it's been done once
it's got to be done a second time (all producers make two negatives, you
see, one for domestic use and one for foreign exportation). Inwardly you
breathe a sigh of relief when finally that particular scene has been
completed and then you want the camera moved up for closeups. (Again, of
course you have marked exactly where you want these closeups. And you
are ready to tell each player exactly what you want him to do over again
for the closeups). And the cameraman busies about setting up his camera
for the first closeup and you are just about to start taking it when the
lunch hour looms up, the electricians and stage hands leave you flat and
you discover that you have to postpone your important work for full
sixty minutes.
In the silent and lonely confines of your office you pace the floor and
wonder how the afternoon is going to turn out. You discover that you
have spent the whole hour pacing and forgotten to eat. No matter, your
appetite was gone anyway and you go back to work, trying to feel ready
for any emergency that the afternoon may produce.
And so the day ends. The afternoon reproduces the experiences of the
morning with variations. The next day reproduces it further. But if you
have gained the confidence of your players and your various assistants
and if you have proven to them that you know what to direct and how to
direct, the work looms much easier. Every late afternoon after the
picture is under way you and your cameraman and your star sit in a dark,
silent projecting room and gaze upon the daily “rushes.” These are the
first prints of the scenes you made the day before. Thus you can see
your work grow and thus also your star sees whether he can place full
confidence in you. If he discovers that he can, your relations improve
as the picture progresses. And after a while you don't even hesitate
about getting out there on the “set” and showing him just how to do a
thing. He'll like it too.
You have also definitely proved to the cameraman and the head
electrician and the assistant director (who knows that he could direct
better than you) that you know more about your business than they know
about it. You have shown them that you know how to arrange your players
in a big scene so as to get the best possible dramatic and artistic
effects, you have shown them that you can direct the manipulation of the
lights so as to produce a different sort of illusion, you have shown
them, briefly, that you know more about camera work than the cameraman,
more about lighting than the electrician, more about acting than the
cast, more about composition than the art director, and more about
writing than the continuity writer.
You may know deep in your heart that you have bluffed them into
believing in your widespread superiority but they don't know it and so
the gods of success are beginning to shine on you.
CHAPTER XX
“STEALING” AN EXTERIOR
_Explaining how directors sometimes film scenes
on busy streets in broad daylight without
passers-by becoming aware of the fact.—An
amusing incident that arose when one director
endeavored to “steal” a succession of rather
dramatic scenes_
[Illustration:
A FRENCH TOWN WAS BUILT FOR “THE FOUR HORSEMEN” MERELY TO BE DESTROYED
]
[Illustration:
A SCOTCH VILLAGE ON LONG ISLAND! ERECTED FOR “SENTIMENTAL TOMMY,”
DIRECTED BY JOHN S. ROBERTSON. IT IS A TRIUMPH ARTISTICALLY BUT
PROVED A FINANCIAL FAILURE
]
CHAPTER XX
One of the most difficult details of production that confronts the
director in the ordinary routine of affairs, is that of “stealing”
exterior scenes. Those who have consistently attended picture shows are
well acquainted with the exterior scenes, the illusion of which is
spoiled, by the gaping and laughing spectators on the side lines. And
then on occasion a street scene will be found that has been filmed right
in the midst of heavy traffic and not one of the many people in the
scene as much as award a sly gap to the camera.
This effect of realism is produced when the director goes to the trouble
of “stealing” an exterior. In “stealing” the director has his camera
“blinded.” There are various sorts of blinds used. A taxicab or
limousine provide effective blinds. The cameraman can get in with his
instrument and shoot the scene going on on the sidewalk and at the same
time remain unnoticed before the majority of passers-by who would
otherwise donate to themselves the roles of spoil-spectators.
Sometimes a truck loaded with packing cases can effectively conceal the
cameraman and his instrument at the same time affording an unobstructed
focal distance between the camera and the scene to be filmed.
Such scenes require careful rehearsing in the studio before departure
for the desired location. Even then, however, the director must rely on
the snap-judgment of himself and his players in the actual taking of the
scene for it will offer peculiarities and differences of topography
impossible of consideration in the studio rehearsals.
Then again, in these scenes the players must wear either the absolute
minimum of makeup to prevent them from being detected as players or,
better yet, wear none at all. If the sunlight happens to be right, none
is worn as a rule.
Often in these scenes peculiarities arise which are interesting. I
recall an exterior scene which a director for one of the large studios
in the east endeavored to “steal” in which the action was of
considerable importance to the story. The scene was supposed to be night
and representing a little traversed residential section of the city.
The action called for the leading man in the case to effect the actions
of a man entirely too full of pre-Volstead liquor for his own benefit.
In brief, after staggering about a bit, he was to collapse in a heap on
the sidewalk. The heroine, coming along at this moment, was called upon
to take pity on the poor wretch and take him into her house before which
he had fallen.
Just as she succeeded in raising him to his feet a policeman was to come
along and question her about the young man's identity. To protect him
she was to claim that he was her husband.
To give the whole scene an added touch of realism it was thought that it
would be better to have several pedestrians pass the hero by as he lay
unconscious on the sidewalk.
The time chosen to take the scene was late afternoon and a little
frequented street was selected for the occasion. A number of people were
passing, however, and these, the director thought, could be used in the
roles of unconscious extras in the picture.
But the director had miscalculated human nature. The passers-by,
unconscious of the presence of a camera in the taxicab, really thought
the actor was unfortunately drunk and several stopped to offer
assistance. The presence of mind of the actor saved the situation. When
two people bent over him and offered assistance, he angrily told them to
be on their ways. Thus repulsed they moved on. Of course the hero
accepted the assistance of the girl as the 'script called for.
But the general effect of the scene was changed by the interest of the
passers-by in the drunken man. It was thought that the majority of folk
regarded such figures with antipathy. Instead they were interested.
The actor who was playing the hero explained the matter afterwards.
“They weren't so all-fired concerned and worried about me,” he said,
“those two fellows that bent over me really wanted to know where I got
it.”
The last part of the scene was interrupted also. The actor made up as
the policeman interfered with the hero and heroine as per the scene but
as he was questioning the heroine as to the identity of the young man a
real policeman appeared on the scene and questioned the made-up
policeman as to his own identity. The masquerading cop told the real
article that a motion picture was being taken and for the love of the
director not to look round at the camera.
The policeman sensed the situation and obeyed orders and as a result the
scene appeared on the screen as if two policemen had entered into an
argument as to what disposition should be made of the drunken man.
Of course, when the scene was done the real policeman was not in the
least averse to accepting a slight reward for his good services.
CHAPTER XXI
THE IMPORTANCE OF THE ART DIRECTOR
_Artists are entering field of motion
picture production both as directors and art
directors.—Advice of the art director should
be sought on exterior scenes.—A few words of
Maurice Tourneur_
CHAPTER XXI
Many artists have found the field of motion picture directing
exceedingly attractive. The majority of them have entered the new field
in the capacity of art directors, planning and supervising the
construction and the dressing of the settings. Several others have
graduated from such posts to the positions of directors.
Perhaps the artistic side of picture production is the one which had
developed less than any of the others. For a long time art directors,
interior decorators and artistic designers were unknown elements in a
motion picture studio. The early picture public demanded sensation and
action. When an interior setting was used furniture was thrown in it
indiscriminately. The more, the better. Grand Rapids and Louis IV
furnishings were thrown in regardless. An early biblical picture showed
the scene of the last supper with the assembled Apostles seated in a
variety of modern furniture from the factories of the middle western
states.
It is only of comparative recency that real artists and architects have
entered the production field. Today all the larger studios have
extensive art departments that co-operate with the director and his
staff in the preparation of the settings. Accuracy distinguishes the
majority of the work of these departments. Errors in period pictures are
seldom to be discerned even by the most watchful.
But as yet the art director has failed to put in an appearance where he
is needed quite as much as in the preparation of the interior settings;
I refer to the exterior. Beautiful as are many of the exteriors seen in
the modern pictures they often lack the proper balance. Any art student
could tell you and point out where the composition of many exteriors is
faulty.
It is too much to ask that every motion picture director be an art
director besides. A man might be perfect as a dramatic director and
still be utterly lacking with respect to composition. But if the
director cannot be versed in both the arts there should be, and
doubtless will be in time, an art director working along with the
dramatic director on every scene, interior or exterior.
The former artists now actually directing are few in number. Perhaps the
foremost of them all is Maurice Tourneur who came from France several
years ago and who was previous to his stage and screen work in that
country, a mural decorator. His early productions here attracted
widespread interest in the art itself because of the evident touch of an
artistic hand. “The Blue Bird” was a triumph from the standpoint of
pictorial artistry. So were several others he made at the same time. But
they didn't make money. So Mr. Tourneur turned to the production of
frankly melodramatic subjects. These he endowed too with all the art at
his command and so lifted melodrama to a higher plane than it ever
reached before.
Perhaps the fate of Mr. Tourneur's “The Blue Bird” is timely to recall
now. Those today who clamor for more artistic and better things on the
screen and who opine that no director or producing company has the
courage to attempt such things and who insist that if such things were
attempted they would be eagerly received, will do well to heed the
pathetic fate of “The Bluebird.” The picture director and producer are
always willing to strive for something a little finer on the screen but
to date the public hasn't given them any appreciable amount of
encouragement.
Hugo Ballin and Penhryn Stanlaws are among the artists now directing who
have attained prominence in both fields. The latter has made long
strides in the short time he has been in a picture studio and gives
promise of attaining the same heights in the newer art that he attained
in his original line of creative endeavor.
[Illustration:
REX INGRAM NEVER LOST TRACK OF HIS PERSONAL STORY IN “THE FOUR
HORSEMEN”
]
[Illustration:
PICTORIAL BEAUTY WAS A DIRECTORIAL ACHIEVEMENT DISPLAYED IN “THE FOUR
HORSEMEN”
A SCENE FROM “THE FOUR HORSEMEN.” HERE IS A STILL THAT ILLUSTRATES REX
INGRAM'S ABILITY TO SUGGEST A SITUATION
]
CHAPTER XXII
DIRECTORIAL CONVENTIONS
_In which the business of slamming directors
in general is freely indulged.—Directors have
created an array of utterly false conventions
by their constant use of them.—A plea for them
to stop.—A particular plea for them to stop
picking on tobacco_
CHAPTER XXII
Most of the chapters in this book, when dealing specifically with the
work of directors, have been keyed in the general tone of praise. The
reader might thus absorb the idea that it is thought no room for
improvement in the youngest of the arts exists. However, most of the men
mentioned in former chapters have consistently worthy records but in
case the idea prevails that I believe the millennium in pictures has
long since been attained, I hereby dedicate this chapter to a general
slamming of every director in the production art. The awful conventions
that every director seems to have adopted as his own (the best directors
and the worst in one degree or another) are one of the eyesores of
modern picture productions.
The little slips in technicalities such as showing a cigar just lighted
in one scene and burned to a butt in the next and the paradoxical fact
that John exits from one interior wearing a brown derby and enters
another wearing a black derby—these little slips which are themselves
conventions of oversight, can be left to the motion picture fans who
constantly write the papers calling attention to them.
There are more real conventions that, little though they are, have long
since become a terrible bore to those who view pictures through eyes at
all critical, simply because directors on a whole seem to have adopted
these conventions as if they were actually real and part of life. I mean
such little things as the ever-present wall safe in the library setting
and the childish and idiotic little dresses with which telephones are
clothed. I am not of the socially elect but no friend of mine maintains
a wall safe in his library, a safe which, with one good firm wrench
properly applied, would leave a gaping cavity in the wall. Neither am I
accustomed to visiting ladies' boudoirs but I am firmly convinced that
dressing a telephone as a doll is something that simply isn't done in
the best regulated families. It is simply and impurely a trick of the
“movies.”
And no more natural is it for every man to keep a pistol in the top
drawer of his desk. I once conducted a surreptitious investigation of
the top drawers of various of my friends and could have acquired a
miscellaneous collection of everything from old Overholt to scissors
without including in it a pistol.
Mention these foolish little conventions to a director and he will enjoy
a hearty laugh over them with you. But the very next day he will return
to his work of producing a picture and use every one of these tricks and
a whole lot more with never so much as a thought. Fortunately, however,
the pistol in the drawer trick has so often been laughed at and down on
the screen that most directors are fighting clear of it.
Another convention which seems to grate against people of taste is the
habit of directors permitting their property man to pile a breakfast
table with dozens of varieties of knives, forks and spoons. The morning
breakfast of the newlyweds usually appears on the screen as a parade of
fine silverware.
Directors, without number, also choose to ignore the common conventions
of gentlemen until, ignoring them to such an extent, they have created
an opposite set of conventions to those that actually exist in all
social circles of life, the poorest and the richest. Specifically,
directors forget to tell their actors to rise when a lady sits at a
table and often are at a loss as to the proper thing for a gentleman to
do with his hat when talking to a lady.
Then there are the horrible directorial conventions regarding college
life. A motion picture college is full of snobs, its dormitories are
made up of rooms wall-papered with pennants and peopled with thirty-five
year old actors in bulky sweaters who never stir without a pipe with a
tremendous bowl and a mandolin or some stringed instrument.
There are, too, the tiresome conventions of the small town with the
inevitable and unrealistic rubes. In fact, here the director has taken a
figure created for burlesque shows and meant only for burlesque shows
and impossible farce comedies and adopted it as a real person, an actual
inhabitant of a real small town.
There are, too, the wearisome conventions of western mining camp life as
shown on the motion picture screen. Perhaps censor boards and writers
have contributed in producing these conventions; chief of which is the
fact that every dance hall queen is virtue personified, a Pollyanna in
spangles, but they are conventions and unreal ones, nevertheless.
There is the unreal mother of the films. The convention is that if she
is a fond and loving mother she must sit and knit and sit and knit and
occasionally wipe away a tear or two. And if she is not represented
thus, as fond and motherly, she must be represented as an impossible
social climber or a freak feminist on a par with the suffragettes of
burlesque shows ten years ago. Normal mothers reach the screen once in a
hundred times.
It is granted again that screen writers and censor boards have assisted
considerably in building up these false conventions, but the director is
the lucky fellow that has it in his power to change them. Let him go
about his task gradually if he so wishes, but let him go about it.
Only recently I had cause to give complaint to the practice of directors
in identifying cigarettes solely with villains. Some of the screen
villains have actually been permitted to reach the point in their
careers when the mere manner of toying with a cigarette signifies some
specific course of villainy. Their actions with cigarettes are as plain
as the old-fashioned moustachioed villain's actions when he strode upon
the stage and pronounced “Curses!”
Such a convention is altogether too dangerous besides being funny. The
reformers have already begun to associate the cigarette with villainy.
And if the directors, through their villains, allow them to go that way,
we will soon see the departure of cigarettes from our midst altogether,
even as the lamented drink has departed—or is supposed to have departed.
I, for one, am going to blame the directors for such a state of affairs.
When a cigarette-legger approaches me in future years and whispers, “I
know where you can get a package of your favorite brand for two
dollars,” I'm going to hit him and curse the director and his
conventions that he wouldn't change even when I thus warned him.
CHAPTER XXIII
ERNST LUBITSCH: GERMAN DIRECTOR
_Lubitsch, on his first visit to American
shores, gives some few of his ideas on picture
directing.—“Passion,” “Deception,” and “The
Wife of Pharaoh” are proof of his skill but he
has faults and can afford to absorb much of
the technique of the American director.—His
discovery of Pola Negri a great stroke_
CHAPTER XXIII
Earlier mention has been made in these pages to German pictures. Lest
this term be confusing to those without the picture trade and in the
hinterlands, it may be explained that these recently imported pictures
are generally advertised as “European pictures,” “continental
spectacles” or with any blanket descriptive phrase that possibly but not
pointedly includes Germany. There seems to be no good cause for refusing
to give the spade its proper name today and if there are still those
unacquainted with the fact, it can here be announced that “Passion,”
“Deception,” “The Golem,” “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,” “One Arabian
Night,” etc., etc., were all produced in Germany.
“Passion” and “Deception,” produced under the direction of the man
considered Germany's foremost director, Ernst Lubitsch, represent the
best in the German art that has yet been extensively shown here in the
United States. There is another production, however, “The Indian Tomb,”
called so temporarily at least, and directed by a gentleman with the
unassuming cognomen of Joe May, that is destined to far overshadow
anything that Mr. Lubitsch has yet been responsible for. But of this
production more anon.
[Illustration:
HERE IS THE SCENE FROM CECIL DE MILLE'S “FORBIDDEN FRUIT” THAT AMAZED
ERNST LUBITSCH
]
[Illustration:
ELSIE FERGUSON IN THE GEORGE FITZMAURICE PRODUCTION OF “PETER
IBBETSON”
]
Mr. Lubitsch, as said, has been accorded tremendous praise on this side
of the Atlantic. The New York critics swept him up to the plane with D.
W. Griffith as soon as “Passion” and “Deception” were publicly shown,
and Mr. Lubitsch positively doesn't belong beside Mr. Griffith, despite
the fact that he is a great artist. However and notwithstanding the
critics have formed such a habit of awarding fulsome praise to
everything that bears the Lubitsch name that the situation is becoming
funny. A gentleman in the production department of one of the large film
companies recently advanced the thought that the company should release
a domestic picture, long considered inferior for the American market,
with the name Lubitsch upon it and the line “made in Germany” stamped
across its face. No matter how bad it was these counterfeits would
assure it of good reviews was the contention.
When the work of Mr. Lubitsch is seriously considered and balanced, the
good points and the bad points, the conclusion must inevitably be
reached that he is an artistic director, but lacking or rather, to give
him the benefit of the doubt, slighting details of production and story,
that give every great picture its lasting stamp of individualism. In a
previous chapter it was contended that the majority of German directors,
in the production of spectacular works, overlooked the personal story in
an effort to be awe-inspiring with their mob scenes. In a sense this
criticism holds true with Mr. Lubitsch. Details of story mean little to
him. In fact, on his first visit to the United States, when interviewed,
he expressed amazement over the fact that Cecil De Mille in one of his
pictures, “Forbidden Fruit,” to be exact, brought out the predicament of
the heroine, a social masquerader, by planting in closeups her hesitancy
about the selection of the right fork for the various courses of a
dinner. Such detail work, which goes a long way toward humanizing a
story no matter how melodramatic the structure of the whole thing may
be, is unknown to the German directors of which Mr. Lubitsch is, at the
moment, the bright and shining example.
Consequently, it may be asked: How can Mr. Lubitsch be placed beside the
American, D. W. Griffith, when in such details Mr. Griffith excels? His
latest spectacle, “Orphans of the Storm,” is proof again that he is a
master of blending the personal story with the spectacular background.
At present, economic situations in Germany permit the production of
spectacles there on a scale of lavishness which our American directors
could not duplicate without sending their backers into bankruptcy. Labor
is so cheap that the most magnificent settings can be erected in the
German studios for small sums of money, sums that would be small even if
the rate of exchange between Germany and the United States which makes
them seem ridiculously small, was more evenly balanced. Thus a new field
of effects is open to the German director that is correspondingly being
denied the American director by the increasing cost of labor and
materials.
Mr. Lubitsch is one of those who has made excellent use of these
magnificent settings provided him. He has peopled them with thousands of
supernumeraries and he is a born artist when it comes to directing the
movements and actions of great groups of people. He manages to get more
movement and color into such scenes than the great majority of American
directors have managed to achieve in the past.
So, too, Mr. Lubitsch seems able to extract the maximum ability from his
actors and actresses. He was an actor once himself and a good one and,
contrary to an opinion, expressed earlier in this book, believes in
showing his actors how to play their scenes. Indeed, they are told very
little concerning the story but rely for all their inspiration upon Mr.
Lubitsch.
In his more serious statements concerning picture directing, Mr.
Lubitsch is mostly inclined to point out the faults of pictures and the
difficulty of producing them, than to explain what he considers the
finer points of directorial technique.
Mr. Lubitsch talked, through an interpreter, about the very weakness of
his and others that has just been noted. “So many pictures that promise
much in their early stages,” he said, “are in the end spoiled by a lack
of the proper balance and blending of all the elements that go to make
the picture. The work of the author is so often sacrificed for the
pictorial effect of the director. The painter (scenic designer) so often
has to give way to the importance of the dramatic scene.”
All of which is exactly right. The majority of American directors whose
work has been considered in this book know just how to achieve proper
balance in their pictures. They know where the work of the author ends
and that of the scenic artist begins. No director worthy of serious
consideration in an American studio today permits his dramatic scenes to
be sacrificed to make way for masterpieces of pictorial background. Nor
does he reverse the mistake and sacrifice pictorial background for
dramatic scenes or anything else. He knows how to achieve the proper
balance.
“I prefer to suggest ideas and situations in my pictures,” he continued,
“rather than to load down a scene with nothing but the starkly
realistic. I prefer my actors, too, to suggest an emotion rather than to
register it obviously on the screen.”
Here, perhaps, more than in any other direction does Mr. Lubitsch's
greatness actually lie. He uses scenes, exteriors, actors to subtly and
powerfully suggest an effect, rather than to use the same properties
merely to obviously point out such an effect. It is this method, too,
that, as has also been pointed out previously, is Rex Ingram's forte.
Mr. Lubitsch's art in this direction is exemplified in both “Passion”
and “Deception” as well as in “The Loves of Pharaoh,” his most recent
picture which he brought with him from Germany.
Mr. Lubitsch went on to say, and every other interviewer seized upon his
words with enthusiasm, that he only cuts his pictures once. Some remarks
have already been recorded on how important a part of picture making is
the cutting and editing of the scenes after they have left the
director's hands. It has been my privilege to see many of Mr. Lubitsch's
pictures as well as a number of other German productions before they
have been shown to the American public. The one great fault with those
produced by Mr. Lubitsch is that they are far from properly cut and
edited.
Hence, I am unable to rush into print to praise Mr. Lubitsch because of
his statement that he only cuts his picture once. Rather, I will write
here the sound advice that in future he cut his pictures eight, nine or
ten times. After Mr. Lubitsch's single cutting of his pictures they run
twice too long for the American public. A point which can be
successfully communicated to an audience in a quick interchange of
closeups by an American director will take Mr. Lubitsch the laborious
interchange of ten or a dozen closeups, the last one differing very
little from the first one.
The reason for this I am unable to account for. Mr. Lubitsch believes in
the art of suggestion as he says. Then why does he drive home a minor
point with so many hammers when a little touch from his index finger is
sufficient to accomplish his ends? Clearly in these two respects Mr.
Lubitsch is a direct contradiction of himself. Does he do this
unwittingly or does he do it because his public (the German public)
demands to have a point driven home with sledge hammer blows? In the
light of no other answer, we must accept the latter conclusion and chalk
the matter up against the stupidity of “continental” picture audiences
which seems a bit harsh.
These words on Mr. Lubitsch seem so unsatisfactory on second reading
that there is an inclination to discard them altogether. In the first
place they have the flavor of 100 per cent Americanism, i.e. attacking
or waxing unenthusiastic about the work of a German director merely
because he is a German director. Which is not the case at all and for
proof of which I ask you to turn quickly to the next chapter.
Mr. Lubitsch has received so much public praise that to go against the
tide here can not help but seem purely the inspiration of a pig-head.
But then there is no denying that Mr. Lubitsch is a contradiction of
himself. He talks about suggestion and then does the sledge-hammer
trick, he talks about cutting his pictures once when such a feat is an
impossibility.
He is an artist, potentially very great without a doubt, but not as
mature as many of his sponsors would have us believe. His tours of the
American studios will doubtless have a marked effect on his future
productions made abroad. It is to be fondly hoped that he will absorb
only the good points of American technique and combine these with the
good points of his own technique, discarding the bad points of each set.
When he accomplishes this I will line up and sing his praises lustily
along with the others who now hail him as a Moses in the bullrushes of
picturedom.
But wait! After all Mr. Lubitsch is great. He discovered Pola Negri.
Hoch!
CHAPTER XXIV
JOE MAY: GERMAN DIRECTOR
_In which it is pointed out that in three of Mr.
May's pictures he displays more qualifications
to be heralded as Germany's best artist than Mr.
Lubitsch.—“The Indian Tomb” a superfine blending
of popular appealing pictorial elements_
CHAPTER XXIV
From the standpoint of producing pictures with tremendous popular appeal
and at the same time investing them with artistic settings, settings
that fairly belie description, and from the standpoint of paying close
attention to detail of story and acting, from these standpoints which
are all important, Joe May, previously mentioned, “has it,” in the
vernacular, “all over” Ernst Lubitsch.
Unfortunately, Mr. May had not, at this writing, ventured to American
shores. When he does come it is fondly hoped that the same interviewers
and critics who scrambled for words from Mr. Lubitsch and considered
them as gold will listen to what Mr. May has to say and consider it
worth something more than the German mark.
I would have liked to include a first hand interview from Mr. May in
this chapter. If I had wirelessed him for his formulae of production he
doubtless would have replied in German idiom: “Get a good story and go
to it.”
To date I have seen three of his pictures, one superbly imagined and
mounted mystical drama, “The Indian Tomb,” one thrilling serial entitled
“The Mistress of the World” and one intense modern society drama at
present entitled “Lavinia Morland's Confession.” And so I can only form
an opinion as to his method of working, of directing his pictures. And
this opinion is that he embraces in his technique all that is
meritorious in the American director's technique, exactly what Ernst
Lubitsch should do to honestly earn the fulsome praise that is his.
[Illustration:
REX INGRAM CAUGHT IN AN INTERESTING SCENE WHILE DIRECTING THE
PRINCIPALS IN “THE CONQUERING POWER”
]
[Illustration:
CECIL B. DE MILLE DIRECTING
CECIL B. DE MILLE WATCHING A REHEARSAL
]
“The Indian Tomb” is by all odds the most amazing picture that I have
ever seen. To begin with, Mr. May had a hand in the adaptation of it. He
collaborated on the continuity which is after the generally approved
method of the best American directors. He spent no end of time on this
work, presumably, for Mr. Lubitsch tells us that all German directors
pore over the continuity of their pictures for weeks and months so that
finally when they are ready to begin the actual filming of the picture
every scene is “fool-proof.” This is the method of Thomas H. Ince to the
letter.
In the second place, Mr. May must have been given half a dozen billion
marks or more to spend on settings. The beautiful Indian settings that
are to be seen in the picture, beautiful, magnificent and tremendous
could never be built for an American production for less than a million
dollars. They greet the eye in such rapid succession that they might be
described, in no tones of aspersion, as bewildering.
Mr. May selected an excellent cast. The actors are possibly without
reputation in Germany. It is safe to say that none of them with the
exception of Mia May, the star, are known broadly. But under Mr. May's
direction, each works with a skill so effective that the spectator is
nearly obliged to forget there is acting going on before his eye. The
Indian Yogi is a commanding, inspiring figure. The Prince breathes
passion, hatred, cunning. The last extra, given a bit to perform, does
it with amazing effect.
Mr. May has given in “The Indian Tomb” a marvelous demonstration of what
tempo means. The whole tempo of his picture, once the story reaches
India is slow—but never tiresome. He seems to have realized that a
picture laid in a mystic locale, a locale strange to nearly everyone who
frequents picture theatres, a locale enriched in poetry, fiction and
song, as a land of uncanny magic, that such a picture demanded a slow,
steady tempo. The effect thus achieved strengthens the story ten-fold.
Played too fast in one phase or another, hurrying over one sequence to
get to another, would have spoiled the magic effect of “The Indian Tomb”
completely.
When “The Indian Tomb” first was imported to these shores its length
approximated eighteen thousand feet! An unheard of length, to be sure.
Of course, it will not reach the American public in such an amount of
footage. There is room for cutting, very careful trimming. But even if
“The Indian Tomb” was shown here in all its abundance of footage, I
doubt very much if it would have proved tiresome except to those with
weak eyes. The magic of its story unfolded before a panorama of
astounding scenes would hold the interest of the most jaded picture
“fan” throughout its entire length.
The Joe May serial, “The Mistress of the World” shown abroad in
forty-eight reels has also been cut down considerably for American
consumption. It was made quite some time previous to “The Indian Tomb”
and as a work of art cannot be compared with it. However, throughout its
various chapters, Mr. May shows the skill which was to attain its
fullest flower in “The Indian Tomb.” Here again are marvelous settings,
here also does he show that he knows the value of tempo, although in
achieving it he has often been forced to labor with poor mechanical
effects. And here, too, does he know how to secure that awe-inspiring
surprise by suddenly showing, unexpectedly but logically, the most
amazing glimpses of extravagant, magnificent scenery.
In the modern society drama, “Lavinia Morland's Confession,” Mr. May has
not bothered about big settings and has discarded the spectacular. And
in this entirely different field of picture production he has emerged
triumphant again with a gripping, intense drama, related by an accused
woman in a crowded court room. Certainly everyone who sees the picture
here is going to imagine himself just another spectator in that court.
Those are the three reasons why Mr. May, in my mind, should be placed on
a higher pedestal than the much praised Mr. Lubitsch. The latter has
shown himself capable of producing spectacles, costume pictures. The
former has shown himself capable of producing any sort of a
picture—except a comedy. I don't think Mr. May could produce a comedy.
His comedy touches in one of his pictures are awful. But there aren't
many of them. And he didn't try any in “The Indian Tomb.”
Mr. May is a showman and an artist. He knows values. He knows and seems
to know full well how to achieve the proper balance in his pictures. He
knows detail and uses it to most effective advantage. And above all, he
seems to be a natural born picture story teller. He is as much a part of
his art as it has been shown that Frank Borzage is a part of his.
Mia May, his wife, is perhaps something about Joe May that American
audiences will object to. Mia May is not young. Americans like young and
pretty faces. Europeans, including Germans, it is said, again referring
to the words of Mr. Lubitsch, tire of a pretty face unless it is
accompanied by ability and even prefer a face not quite so pretty and
not quite so young if the ability is to be found in it.
CHAPTER XXV
ILLUSTRATING THE USE OF DETAIL
_Bringing just the right amount of detail of
story to the screen a rare accomplishment.—“The
Law and the Woman” a practical illustration of
the injection of the proper proportion_
CHAPTER XXV
The question of detail has come up so often in the discussion of various
directors and in their various discussions regarding directing that a
few more words are, perhaps, due on the all important matter.
The injection of detail in a story is by right the work of the
continuity writer. However, most of the directors that have been
referred to here, as said, are either their own continuity writers or
they exercise such close supervision or collaboration over and on their
continuities that here at least the injection of detail is the
director's duty. Even when a director follows a continuity closely
without having had a hand in its construction he often realizes where
detail will help the completed picture due to some peculiarity of
setting and location, and so he may inject it of his own accord.
Detail is, without doubt, an element that often distinguishes good
pictures from bad. A superfluity of story detail is a bad thing. If a
director permits himself to wander off the main track and introduce
irrelevant details believing that they have interest in themselves
alone, he soon finds trouble getting back to the main track again.
On the other hand, knowing just where a little injection of detail, a
little prolongation of this situation or that, will help a story, is a
knack or a separate art that is by no means common among directors. To
give this exceedingly technical matter a popular light it is best to
cite an instance where a picture was lifted into the class of
melodramatic masterpieces by the skillful use of it. This instance is
represented by “The Law and the Woman,” a picture directed by Penrhyn
Stanlaws.
This picture is based on the old Clyde Fitch play, “The Woman in the
Case.” The situation established is this: A woman of no virtue whatever
brings evidence to bear against an innocent man who thereupon is tried
and convicted of murder and is sentenced to die in the electric chair.
The man's wife, convinced of his innocence, enters into the other
woman's circle of friends, plays the part of a sister under the skin and
ultimately succeeds in forcing a confession from her that frees her
husband—at the last minute.
This basic situation is rather old. It has appeared on the screen in
various guises from time immemorial. The accused man—the last minute
confession. The climax used to be the mad dash to the prison (the
telephone wires were always out of order) and the rescue of the
condemned just as the executioner was about to throw the electric
switch.
Naturally then, a picture-wise being knows full well the outcome of “The
Law and the Woman” even while he is in the thick of the situation. The
director knew this too—knew that his audience was going to know how his
story ended. How then to make them forget that they knew it? How to make
them so interested in the happenings on the screen that they were caught
up in them and lost sight of the foregone conclusion altogether? The
answer: By the judicious use of detail.
This judicious application of detail is to be found in “The Law and the
Woman” as directed by Mr. Stanlaws. The wife is several times about to
hear the confession from the lips of the other woman. “It's coming now,”
you think. But no! Some little detail arises to prevent it. The
telephone rings and when the conversation is over the other woman's
inclination for confidences has passed. Again the confession is about to
come when the other woman (exercising the prerogative of her sex)
suddenly changes her mind.
A half dozen other such little details halt that confession, the while
the spectator has completely forgotten that he knows the outcome. All he
is interested in is that confession.
In the final climax when the desired words are wrenched from the woman's
lips detail is again brought admirably into play. The woman's
superstitions are preyed upon. She is alone at a table. A door slams. A
shade flies up. Her nerves grow ragged. So do yours. Throughout it all
the utmost suspense is maintained until finally when the confession
comes you breathe the same sigh of wonderful thanks and relief that is
breathed by the wife.
For skillful use of detail then, Penrhyn Stanlaws' work in “The Law and
the Woman” is commended. And in case I am not giving credit where credit
is due, Albert S. LeVino prepared the continuity.
[Illustration:
“THE LAW AND THE WOMAN” IS A REMARKABLE ILLUSTRATION OF HOW
JUDICIOUSLY APPLIED DETAIL CAN HEIGHTEN A DRAMATIC EFFECT. IT WAS
DIRECTED BY PENHRYN STANLAWS
]
[Illustration:
“FORBIDDEN FRUIT” IS AN EXTRAVAGANT, FASCINATING MELODRAMA DIRECTED BY
CECIL DE MILLE—A NEW VERSION OF HIS OLD PICTURE, “THE GOLDEN
CHANCE,” DONE IN HIS SALAD DAYS
]
CHAPTER XXVI
MARSHALL NEILAN SUMMARIZES
_Mr. Neilan, whose moods run the range of
human emotions, believes that many directors
forget to put themselves in the places of
their audiences.—Loss of proper perspective
results.—Mr. Neilan also summarizes in such
complete fashion that he concludes the
argument_
CHAPTER XXVI
It appears after all that Cecil De Mille is the only director in the
producing art who doesn't believe in showing his players how to play a
scene. Here comes Marshall Neilan with some words on directing and the
first thing he says is: “One of the most potent assets of the director
is his own ability to act. It is a difficult matter to tell a person how
to do certain things if one doesn't know how to do it one's self. It is
a simple matter to stop an actor in his work and tell him he isn't doing
it right, but it is another matter entirely to get out on the set and
show him the error of his ways before the camera. Therefore, a
director's ability to act is a first asset.”
This, coming on top of the De Mille formula is disconcerting.
Disconcerting because both Mr. De Mille and Mr. Neilan manage to get the
utmost from their players. And they go about it in entirely different
ways it would seem. As a result neither one of them can be wrong and
they both must be right. A cold can be cured by repeated swallows of hot
scotch but others prefer to stuff themselves full of quinine and let it
go at that. The cold is done away with in both cases. Hence good
performances are seen in both Neilan and De Mille pictures.
Mr. Neilan elaborates further on the subject thus: “By the same token it
is more or less impossible to correct the portrayal of a certain piece
of business if you haven't the ability to demonstrate just how it should
be corrected. In practically every scene that a director takes he is
obliged first to get out on the set and show an actor or an actress how
to perform a bit of business or how to register an expression. So,
naturally a director must be able to act. He may be a bad actor or a
good one but as long as he is able to show what he wants done and how he
wants it done his work is going to be much easier.
“This is specially true in the handling of children on the screen.
Children, talented or not, are not possessed of years of actual stage or
screen experience which is necessary to give a performer the proper
finesse and polish in actual screen work. The director with the ability
to act can get out before the camera and go through the child's part for
him, incorporating in it the polish that he desires the child to put
into it. If the child is a good mimic the rest is easy. And I am not
afraid that in mimicking me the child is going to give a mechanical
performance.”
Mr. Neilan knows whereof he speaks when it comes to handling children.
Two of his best pictures, “Penrod” and “Dinty” were stories with a boy
actor, Wesley Barry, playing the principal role. In fact, it is due to
Mr. Neilan's tutelage that young Barry has reached his present state of
popularity. He has come under other directors besides Mr. Neilan but the
teachings he received from the creator of his two best pictures still
remain.
Continuing on the same theme Mr. Neilan says: “The merit of an actor's
performance depends in ratio on the director's ability to show him what
he wants. This accounts for the reason that certain actors and actresses
receive flattering praise for their performances under one director
while under the next director they may fail miserably. Any number of
such instances could be cited but I have lots of friends among the
actors and actresses and I don't want to turn them into enemies over
night.”
I do not altogether subscribe to this statement of Mr. Neilan's. It is
quite true that players have gained fame under one director and then
worked with another and fallen down on the job. In fact one producing
company recently elevated a certain actress to stardom because of her
excellent work in one of its big pictures. But as soon as she left the
guidance of the director who made this picture her ability seemed to
take wings and leave her in the lurch.
But blaming these sudden transitions from good to bad on the directors
ability to show an actor how to work, and the next fellow's refusal or
inability to show him how is not, to my way of thinking, exactly right.
It may have something to do with it but after all if a director shows
all his players how he wants a scene done, the result, as Mr. De Mille
pointed out, would eventually result in the entire cast giving
mechanical imitations of the director in a protean act. An actor does
better work for certain directors, included among which is Mr. Neilan,
because for such directors he has respect, he believes in their ability,
they retain his confidence. Then too Mr. Neilan and the others inspire
an actor to his greatest efforts. The enthusiasm of the artistic
director is communicated to the actor. If he is any sort of an actor he
simply can't go wrong when working under the direction of a truly
artistic director such as Mr. Neilan.
“The dramatic sense—the sense of dramatic construction” continues Mr.
Neilan, “is another highly important asset of the motion picture
director. This remark is, of course, somewhat obvious but in my opinion
there are too many so-called directors who turn out machine-made
pictures and the chief reason that they are machine-made is because
their makers don't know the least thing about construction. Half of them
wouldn't know a dramatic situation if it was thrust under their various
noses.
“It doesn't make any difference whether this dramatic sense is a result
of years of study of the drama or whether it is just a subconscious
sixth sense thrown in along with the other five. It's the same in other
branches of work, creative or otherwise. Some men become great generals
through long years of study and application to the science of war.
Another man just steps in and is able to converse with them on even
terms because he is an instinctive general. In the motion picture
producing art every director who has created a position for himself has
either acquired the dramatic sense through years of study or else has it
ingrained in him so deeply that he couldn't lose it even if his job were
cleaning streets.
“There are many of our directors in the latter class. Fellows born with
the dramatic sense. The art of picture producing has recruited so many
young men that perhaps the majority of them must needs be put in this
class. In the year to come I sincerely believe that the study of the
creation of motion pictures will be taught as an art or craft just as
playmaking is today. In fact, the scenario classes in many of the
universities now are paving the way for the broader classes to come.
Most of the dramatic scholars in the picture art have been recruited
from the stage. These are the men who have the traditions and the
teachings of drama at their finger tips.
“Where does this sense help? A plain instance is the director's ability
or inability to know when a situation is handled correctly in a story.
His dramatic sense will answer the question for him. If the situation is
treated falsely he will know how to change it—he will instantly detect
the fault and eliminate it.”
Here Mr. Neilan takes up the same line of thought that I endeavored to
set down in the second chapter of this book. The power of visualization,
which enables a director to detect the right from the wrong, is the
second most important asset of the motion picture director. Without it
he is totally at a loss. This dramatic sense, or rather this
dramatic-picture sense is really nothing less than the power of
visualization. The two things work to the same end and, call it what you
will, no man can ever hope to be a director and live to be recognized as
such without the power of visualization or, according to Mr. Neilan, the
sixth sense.
“Perhaps I should place ahead of these two requisites,” Mr. Neilan goes
on to say, “the ability of the director to put himself in the place of
his audience—to view his work through not only neutral but critical
eyes. First it is necessary to keep within the understanding of the
average photoplay audience. And, don't forget, that it has been
discovered that the age of the average picture audience is startlingly
low—somewhere in the 'teens'. If we present things on the screen that
are five years ahead of an audience we aren't the right kind of
creators. It is just as bad to do this as to present something five
years behind the times.
“Like all directors I know there is room for improvement in screen work.
The art is young yet and has got to advance slowly, mainly because its
tremendous and cosmopolitan following will only advance slowly. The
motion picture can't afford to go too far ahead of its audience. It can
keep a few paces ahead and encourage its audiences to come up those few
paces but it can't go too far afield.
“This matter of a director viewing his work from the vantage point of
the audience has a more practical application as well. The director must
retain his perspective on his picture—must retain, that is, his first
fresh perspective. So many directors become so satiated in their work
that they lose the value of their pictures. They have gone over their
stories in every scene from the scenario all through the process of
directing and in the cutting room where they are confronted with the
difficult task of bringing their pictures down to the required length
they are inclined to cut out valuable story material. They know their
stories so well that they forget an audience only sees them once, that
an audience as a rule is in total ignorance of the story until it begins
on the screen. Therefore every point of value in the story must be
retained. And to accomplish this the director must jump outside himself
and view his picture from the standpoint of the layman every time that
he has anything to do with it.
“This loss of perspective is one of the reasons why we have 'jumpy'
pictures and pictures that seem lacking in continuity.”
Mr. Neilan concludes the subject with these words: “Above all, I
consider that the director's appreciation of the human side of life is
his greatest asset. Unless a director is thoroughly human down to the
very earth and appreciative of the things in life that are common to the
ordinary mortal he can not hope to attain any degree of success. If he
himself has suffered, if he is a close student of human nature and can
reflect the human things on the screen then he automatically becomes a
successful director—I might almost say a true artist.”
Mr. Neilan hasn't bothered to list his own abilities which are manifold.
His moods run the range of human emotions. He can transport an audience
with the quiet beauty and sincere pathos of his work as he did in the
best Mary Pickford picture ever made, “Stella Maris,” or he can become
positively Goldbergian in his creations and rival Mack Sennett as he did
in “Dinty.”
Mr. Neilan is his own best answer to all the arguments he has set forth
here.
I had intended to attach a summary to this book, listing the
requirements of the successful director but on beginning the task I find
that I would be merely duplicating Mr. Neilan's words. He has compiled
the summary.
[Illustration:
MARSHALL NEILAN
]
[Illustration:
MARSHALL NEILAN (SEATED) DIRECTING WESLEY BARRY IN A SCENE FOR
“PENROD”
]
CHAPTER XXVII
“BEST DIRECTED” PICTURES
_A list of contemporary pictures in each one of
which the art of the director has been best
displayed_
CHAPTER XXVII
I am not going to try, in conclusion, to list the best directed pictures
made during the life of the picture producing art. Such a list would
necessarily be overlong while those that we considered masterpieces
three years ago are inferior when matched beside the worthy productions
of today. The only picture that seems to have lived is “The Birth of a
Nation.” This first pretentious work of D. W. Griffith will naturally
rank high in any list of “best pictures.” So, too, do some of the
earlier Chaplin pictures which have been reissued many times under
different titles.
The list of best directed pictures appended therefore does not belong
particularly to one period of producing activity. It does contain,
however, pictures that will be as good five years from the moment of
writing as they were when first shown on the screens of the picture
theatres. Time dims the quality of the great rank and file of pictures
but it will have a difficult time rubbing the polish from these.
Doubtless many others should be included. There are the delightful
comedies of Constance Talmadge, the more serious works of Norma
Talmadge, numbers of Mary Pickford pictures and numbers of Douglas
Fairbanks pictures that will perhaps live longer than those included
here. William S. Hart has immortalized himself forever yet recent
pictures of his fail to react in as powerful a manner as his earlier
work.
Furthermore, there have been some exceedingly popular pictures that have
been very badly directed. No effort has been made to include these. And
no effort has been made to include minor pictures quite well directed.
All points in the matter of direction have been considered. Minor faults
have been glossed over when the merits have swung the scales
overwhelmingly in their direction.
The list, finally, is not to be taken as anything more than
contemporary.
“Shoulder Arms” and “The Kid,” directed by Charles Chaplin. Because, in
addition to being the best comedies produced, they show a marvelous
insight into human nature and because the dividing line between their
comedy and the tragedies that might result from the same situations, is
but the width of a hair.
“Way Down East,” directed by D. W. Griffith. Because here is a masterly
handled picturization of a famous old melodrama. Because the rough edges
have been smoothed over by the master hand of the director and because
it closes in the biggest thrill ever presented on the screen.
“Orphans of the Storm,” directed by D. W. Griffith. Because here is a
masterly handled picturization of a famous old melodrama, etc.
“Miss Lulu Bett” and “Midsummer Madness,” directed by William C. De
Mille. Because both pictures, dealing with classes of people remotely
removed from one another, contain a penetrating and true study of
character and because these characters have been welded together in both
instances in potent, dramatic pictures.
“The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” and “The Conquering Power,”
directed by Rex Ingram. Because tragedy and spectacle has been handled
in the one, and tragedy in the other, with the discriminating eye of an
artist. Because each presents its director as able in creating an
illusion on the screen so complete as to dissolve the theatre walls into
a part of the picture itself.
“The Three Musketeers,” directed by Fred Niblo. Because it is the best
of Douglas Fairbanks' many best. Because it displays the fact that its
director knows how to apply modern technique to a classic and still
preserve the worth of the classic.
“Disraeli,” directed by Henry Kolker. Because it is the best screen
version of a celebrated play ever produced.
“The City of Silent Men,” directed by Tom Forman. Because it raises a
crook melodrama to the level of high art.
“Humoresque,” directed by Frank Borzage. Because it is the most faithful
presentation of racial traits and characteristics filmed. Because its
director reveals in it his uncanny power of developing a screen
character until you can almost hear it speak.
“Sentimental Tommy,” directed by John Robertson. Because a rare and
beautiful story has been transferred to the screen without harm or loss
and because in it its director gave one of the most eloquent answers
ever given to those who claim there are no artists in the art of picture
producing.
“Peter Ibbetson,” directed by George Fitzmaurice. Because a rare and
beautiful story has been transferred to the screen without harm or loss
and because in it its director gave one of the most eloquent answers
ever given to those who claim there are no artists in the art of picture
producing.
“Stella Maris,” directed by Marshall Neilan. Because it is the best
picture in which Mary Pickford has ever appeared.
“Little Lord Fauntleroy,” directed by Al Green and Jack Pickford.
Because something approaching an artistic achievement has been made from
this ancient too-sentimental work.
“The Indian Tomb,” directed by Joe May. Because, with the exception of
humor, it blends every motion pictorial element in a whole so absorbing
that time means nothing.
“Tol'ble David,” directed by Henry King. Because the spirit of the
original work, a work of literary merit, has been skillfully
communicated to the screen.
“The Law and the Woman,” directed by Penrhyn Stanlaws. Because an old
plot has been translated into terms of intense melodrama through the
judicious use of detail.
“Scratch My Back,” directed by Sidney Olcott. Because it is an original,
ingenious comedy done in excellent taste.
“Over the Hill,” directed by Harry Millarde. Because it is a sentimental
tear-jerker done in the most highly skilled fashion.
“Forbidden Fruit,” directed by Cecil B. De Mille. Because it represents
its director at his exotic, most extravagant best.
“Passion,” directed by Ernst Lubitsch. Because it displays the art of
handling big masses of people colorfully and because with its
spectacular scenes there is a blending of an absorbing personal story.
“Dinty,” directed by Marshall Neilan. Because it is one of the most
captivating, rollicking and delightfully foolish things ever done on the
screen.
“Doubling for Romeo,” directed by Clarence Badger. Because it is one of
the most captivating, rollicking and delightfully foolish things ever
done on the screen.
“The Silent Call,” directed by Laurence Trimble. Because it is the best
melodramatic novelty of the year.
“The Miracle Man,” directed by the late George Loane Tucker.
Because—well, just because.
“The Loves of Pharaoh,” directed by Ernst Lubitsch. Because it is the
best work of this director. Because in it he more nearly actually
reaches his publicity pedestal than in any other of his pictures.
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_Published and Copyrighted by_
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_Used as supplementary texts in_
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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
1. Corrected require to acquire on p. 5.
2. Corrected exists to exits on p. 27.
3. Corrected chining to chinning on p. 97.
4. Corrected everyone to “every one” on p. 191.
5. Corrected Pharoah to Pharaoh on p. 195.
6. Corrected pour to pore on p. 209.
7. Added of after most on p. 214.
8. Corrected site to cite on p. 214.
9. Silently corrected typographical errors.
10. Retained anachronistic and non-standard spellings as printed.
11. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.