The soul of the moving picture

by Walter Julius Bloem

[See p. [83]]

This splitting up of the film action, however, into individual scenes, which are not photographed in their logical sequence, brings into the artistry of the film actor that profound psychic cleft, even physical disruption, which fundamentally differentiates his creative activity from that of the actor on the legitimate stage. The action does not carry him into his playing, or into the inner nature of his rôle, in calm, gradual development. On the contrary, the flood-tide of feeling springs up obviously without the proper motivation, and ends with a suddenness that suggests that someone cut it off before it had been fully lived out. There is no such thing as a gliding and swelling of mood such as is necessary, it would seem, to effect a mild and logical transition from scene to scene.

This causes the actor and the manager all manner of difficulty; neither is able to gain a complete survey of the work to be done. Where the regular stage actor brings his mind into the proper equilibrium, we might say equanimity, slowly, step by step, and with a careful studying of the objective that is to be taken, so that the climax of his effort will stand out from the subsidiary efforts that have led up to it, the film actor scatters his entire energy over all the scenes, and some of them are not merely preparatory to the climax, they are in themselves of a distinctly subordinate nature. When a case really arises in which there is perfect artistic gradation, each scene receiving the emphasis it deserves and the climax rising up above all that has gone before, we may be certain that this is due to the solemn fact that both the acting and the management have been in possession of unqualified artistic appreciation, that each has worked in harmony with the other, and that the eventual and final success of the achievement has been due to unusual excellence in the way of creating and producing a picture. When this happens, however, the layman remains altogether unaware of it. He takes it for granted. But even he appreciates the astonishing effect of it all; he somehow knows that the performance was perfect. He feels the perfection though he is unable to explain it.

Take the case of Lubitsch’s Sumurun. The histrionic brilliancy of it was due to the fact that it consisted of an unbroken and dazzling chain of episodes and pictures. The truth is, this disadvantage that is inherent in the technique of the film can be removed only by the author. He must see to it that there is a rhythm about his scenes; these must rise and fall naturally and smoothly.

An excess of magnificence is easier to endure than a total lack of ebullient ingenuity. The average film is a tedious, wooden affair that moves along with the slowness of all that is mediocre and commonplace. For in the very inherent inability to get a complete survey of what is taking place lies a hazard which only the best of film actors, and these only when urged on and inspired by the best of producers, can take with ease or success: the hazard lies in the fact that the entire character of a figure is tuned either to a sharp or a flat note, in a major or a minor key, and once set going it works like an unwelcome narcotic. The actor plays on a certain day just one individual scene, now from the first and then from the last and still again from some intervening act. Then on still another day he takes up another scene from another act, and so on until the mosaic of all the scenes has been, not composed or arranged in becoming sequence, but heaped up in a veritable pile.

It is perfectly easy to see how that fine feeling that is associated with real art, and which even the least gifted actor in the spoken drama has at his immediate disposal, escapes the less gifted film actor, when this method of playing is in vogue, and especially so if he is not carried along by a colorful bit of poetry. He is simply not in a position to bring new colors, new tones, new passions into his acting, and therefore into his act. The result of all this is that entire film actions are played by one or several actors on a single string. The women of the film fraternity are frequently characterized by this very type of playing; indeed, it is rare that any one of them can boast of the innate possession of that choice ability which enables them to vary the chords that are struck in their souls by the actions they are supposed to depict.

There are a few, however, who have the psychic power which spells variety in the creation of character. In Germany there is first of all Mady Christians; and then there is Lil Dagover. France has only one such film actress, and she is but little known: Marie-Louise Tribe. In Sweden, Karin Molander and Tora Teje are noted for their genius in this direction. In America, colorful film actresses are as numerous as the sands of the sea. But in all film countries the average film actress is a tired, tedious, washed-out, and worn-out character.

Such lifeless moving pictures present us consequently with the soporific drama of a single sorrow or grief or pain, of a conventional melancholy, sadness, or lament. And these emotions are reiterated time out of mind, and through the abnormal exploitation of sentimentality they become swollen and mendacious. Indeed, even buoyancy and mirth can sound hard and tinny if they are made to trip along without variation or interruption.

It is the task of the author and the producer to work hand and hand with the actor to the end that he may be enabled to put life into his acting. To do this, flashes of light must be shed, in the real and artistic sense, on the action of the play; the individual scene must be made to appear in its true light with regard to the play as a whole—that is to say, this must be done if the complete and completed play is to give the effect of unified art, art as an entity, art in its totality.

The dissection of the action into countless inorganic parts naturally has its effect on the artistic form of the film actor, and gives to his efforts a tone and quality that is altogether different from what we are accustomed to in the case of the actor in the spoken drama.