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.