Chapter IXMOUNTAINS AND MOLEHILLS

Why D. W. Griffith has been more successful in producing spectacular features than other directors.—His ability to step from the mountain to the molehill with agility and delicacy.—The futility of mob scenes that mean mob scenes and nothing more

Chapter IX

The foregoing words on D. W. Griffith have brought to mind the matter of motion picture spectacles, those pictures telling a personal story before a background of masses of people and monstrous settings. There is small doubt but that the spectacle is the most difficult of all motion pictures to produce. Mr. Griffith has succeeded most often with such subjects, perhaps because he has attempted them more often. Rex Ingram succeeded admirably well in “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” and no doubt will succeed again when he tries further, as he most surely will.

Many others have succeeded too, and many have failed, the chief reason for the failures being, it appears, that the spectacle idea appealed to the director in capital letters while he forgot all about the personal element of the story. No spectacle, no matter how grand and glittering and gorgeous, no matter how heavily peopled with costumed supernumeraries, no matter how thickly smeared with money and elaborate “art” can succeed if the director forgets about his personal story in the bigness of his background. He must be able to step from the mountain to the molehill with agility and with such delicacy of touch that he doesn't smash the molehill by treading on it as if it were the mountain.

As an example of this appreciation of both the spectacular and personal elements of story, no better picture can be found than Mr. Griffith's “Hearts of theWorld,” his story of the European war. He brought before the eye all the horrible realities of the battle field, used them to dramatic purpose time and again. And yet in the midst of all this spectacular action he never for once lost sight of the personal element in the story, this element represented on the battle field by Robert Harron who played the part of the young soldier. How many people who saw “Hearts of the World” can forget the scene in the shell hole in which the center of attention were the young soldier and the dying negro? This was one of the most remarkable of the personal, intimate touches in the picture and yet the very next moment the spectator was plunged back into the mass horror of the tremendous conflict.

This was only an instance of many. In the last scenes which looked forward to the armistice parade in Paris (looked forward to it with an uncanny amount of judgment), soldiers and citizens were seen going mad with joy in the streets of the city. A thrilling sight in itself were these mass scenes, showing thousands of people nearly breaking their own and their friends' necks with unrestrained joy at peace come at last.

But even in the midst of all these scenes of thrilling revelry the four principal characters of the picture were introduced rejoicing too. And the glimpses shown of them brought the thrills of the big scenes to a tremendous emotional climax.

It would seem a simple matter for the clear-thinking director to produce a spectacular picture at the same time keeping his finger on the pulse of the intimate, personal story that gives color and reality to the bigness of his backgrounds. But it is more often the case than not that the director who tackles a spectacle forgets his story in the mad rush for sweeping effect. As a consequence he loses his grip on the interest of his audience.

“THE THREE MUSKETEERS” COMBINED THE ELEMENTS OF ROMANCE AND THRILL IN EXACTLY THE RIGHT PROPORTIONS

DIRECTOR JOHN ROBERTSON SECURED EXCELLENT LIGHTING AND DERIVED WONDERFUL WORK FROM HIS CAST IN “SENTIMENTAL TOMMY”

How many pictures could be named in which just mass scene after mass scene appeared on the screen, containing no dramatic purpose, no interest aside from their sheer spectacular value (an interest that soon dies if not fostered with glimpses of the personal story), just mass scene after mass scene until the spectator begins to wonder what in thunder the whole thing means? It seems offhand that any number of such pictures could be named.

But if the director keeps his senses about him he never loses sight of the little things of the spectacle, they are as vitally important as the mass action itself.

It might be appropriate to mention the recent German pictures in this connection. The German picture director is noted for the production of spectacular features. In some respects he surpasses the American director, namely in the artistry of his big scenes and the effective manner in which he handles large numbers of people but on the other hand the German director has the fault of overlooking the personal story in his eagerness to get the spectacular effects.

This fact is particularly noticeable in German pictures when they first come to this country. Of course the pictures first have to pass through the hands of experts. The titles are translated and revised to fit the styles the American public has long since expresseditself satisfied with. But more important, much that the German director left in has to be cut out. Pictures made in Germany and shown here as five or six or seven reel features very often run eight or nine or ten reels when they first are imported here. And in these extra reels which the American cutters painlessly remove from here, there and everywhere in the long stretch of the film, are mob scenes used just because they are mob scenes. Mob scene follows mob scene, until each scene has no particular meaning, the mass effects grow tiresome and the spectator longs for a glimpse of the story forgotten so long ago by the director. The American cutter is able to eliminate much of these superfluous scenes but he can not give the intimate story the prominence that was denied it in the beginning by the German director.

Probably the reason why so many directors neglect this personal element in their spectacles is because of the fact that several years ago a big scene, that is a scene containing a few dozen or a few hundred people, was supposed to impress audiences with the fact that a lot of money had been spent on the picture and that therefore, because a lot of money was spent on it, it was a work of merit.

“Here,” a director used to say when he had doubt in the value of the story he was working on, “Give me a big ball room set and a hundred people in evening clothes and I'll give this picture real class.”

The argument sounds particularly false and unsound today as it was all the time. But the motion picture directors of today, a great many of them at least, stillseem to think that a picture can be made good by throwing a lot of money away on lavish settings, and settings containing a lot of people, even though they fail to regard the personal element of the story in a serious light, even though they fail to make this element convincing and real.

Some of the biggest directors in the business have this idea, strange as it may seem. These fellows, believing themselves secure, take delight in poking fun at Mr. Griffith because he will stop a spectacular scene now and then to show a youngster playing with kittens. Mr. Griffith may have been inclined to pay too much attention to kittens and puppies at one time in his career but he was headed along on the right track and those who laughed at these scenes of his were then and there switched off to the wrong track.

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