Art. 12.-THE CINEMA.

WHEN introducing his daughter, Ninetta, to the notice of Nicholas Nickleby, that rhetorical showman, Mr Vincent Crummles, summed up her peculiar characteristics in terms which might be applied without undue strain to that form of popular entertainment which now threatens to drive his successors from the scene. This, sir,' said Mr. Crummles, 'this is the infant phenomenon. ... I'll tell you what, sir, the talent of this child is not to be imagined. She must be seen, sir-seen-to be ever so faintly appreciated.' The picture-play is beyond all question the 'infant phenomenon' in the world of showmanship to-day-a 'phenomenon' boasting millions of admirers in every country, and one which, howsoever faintly appreciated by the critical, must certainly be reckoned with in any social survey of the times.

There is no escaping the Cinema. Its reach and grasp, its vagaries and pretensions, and what, in the technical sense, at any rate, it may justly call its triumphs and achievements, are manifest on all sides. One can hardly pick up a newspaper in these days without seeing that yet one more 'masterpiece' in the realms of fiction or the drama has been, or is about to be, filmed. The illustrated magazines and home journals are full of photographs and anecdotes of screen favourites; while the camera has lured nearly every star of the stage within its focus and even got Royalty itself to act for a moving picture. Prospectuses of new producing companies and cinema halls are almost a daily feature of the press. The pictures are being adapted to the service of education in the schools, industry in the factories, religion in the churches, and the pastimes of the private household. The clergy of all denominations preach sermons on them, for and against; 'welfare' institutions debate their moral influence, literary institutions their artistic worth, and municipal councillors their intimate connexion with the problem of housing the people who flock to see them. Society leaders do not disdain to 'walk on in a picture-play that is to be well advertised; and the testimonials of civic dignitaries, men of letters, scientists, and doctors are eagerly sought by the film showmen to add to the mass of their less authoritative methods of

publicity. This, one may say, is undeniably an 'infant phenomenon' among our modern arts of amusement. And in the case of such a versatile and resourceful young lady it is impossible to tell what she will be up to' next. It must suffice, on this occasion, to look a little closely into some of the things she is up to' now, to analyse her artistic pretensions, and, above all, to examine the basis of her latest claim to be regarded as a serious medium of moral and educational propaganda.

It is a significant fact in connexion with the Cinema that, while its sponsors have shrieked themselves hoarse in proclaiming the lofty moral lessons' and 'fearless social truth' of this, that, and the other five-reel sensation, the 'phenomenon' itself has been forced on the attention of outsiders principally through the appearance of its name in the police court, and the frequent association of its influence with youthful depravity. A good deal of this, of course, can be discounted at once. The puritanic opponents of any and every type of theatrical display may always be relied upon to judge-and condemn -a show on the strength of the poster outside. The enmity of the picture-theatre manager's rivals, too, whether of the 'legitimate' or the 'variety' stage, who see a lengthening stream of patrons at the cinema doors, and only a 'beggarly array of empty benches' in their own houses, may also be allowed for. But it is difficult at times to suppress the suspicion that the atmosphere of suggestiveness, at any rate, alleged by some to cling round the flickering shadows of the screen, would have had to be invented if it did not already exist, if only to impart that fillip of excitement to an art which otherwise it can scarcely be said to possess for the adult mind, once the first novelty has died away.

A long and close consideration of the kind of appeals made by the film manufacturer to his client, and by the film exhibitor to his, leads one to the conclusion that the Trade generally has not been far behind its critics in calling attention-'obliquely and by inference '—to the salacious character of some of its goods. The Cinema is a 'great power for good,'' a tremendous moral instrument,' and, of course, 'a strong incentive to patriotism'; one even heard that it was 'helping to win the war.' But, mingling with all these pious protestations, there is

the unmistakable undertone of desire in some quarters to be able to 'dish' the Censor and get past the Watch Committees with pictorial versions of Five Weeks,' 'Three Nights,' or 'Ten Minutes,' and other shady fiction of that type.

These examples are not introduced to mark any special condemnation of the pictures as such, but merely to give an idea of the unfortunate surroundings in which the 'infant phenomenon' has been brought up, and the deplorable line of championship adopted by many of her backers. Mr Chesterton remarked a little while ago that it was not science he objected to so much as the shadow of science. Similarly, one might say that it is not the pictures which are wrong, so much as the shadow of the showmen on the pictures. An attack was made upon a certain film by a church fraternity in Kent the other day for no other reason than that the posters advertising it were conceived in a style to attract the prurient. If these good people had ventured to inspect the film they would have found it to be as innocuous, and as dull, as a Sunday-school tract. Wise cinema-goers know better than to suppose that the picture outside has much bearing on the picture within. The young man who is enticed into these places by the voluptuous poses of the lady on the bills is doomed to almost the same kind of disillusionment as awaits him when he purchases from a specious hawker a copy of The Wide, Wide World' under the impression that he is getting 'The Maiden Tribute to Modern Babylon.' He might well ask, as the lady did at the tame French play, 'Quand l'adultère commence-t-il?' The naked truth' in the prefigurement of the pictures may be represented by a shapely and scantily-clothed siren. But the actual vision, as projected by the operator, is usually somewhat ambiguous as regards the 'nakedness,' though it may leave but small doubt about the truth.' Those who go for 'sex' have to be content with a model rather heavily draped in a corner, and a philosophic sub-title obfuscating the situation.

Lately, however, the 'infant phenomenon' has been bidding for favour in a more serious rôle than she had hitherto assumed. Having begun by filming a dozen fat gendarmes chasing a man in his nightshirt (' comic') and

the process of manufacturing clay pipes (educational'), she is now rather ostentatiously donning the mantle of propagandist drama for the main purpose, it would seem, of revealing to our affrighted eyes the ravages of venereal disease. A trio of propaganda pictures has recently been enjoying all the sweets of advertisement which accompany an ineffectual interdict. One of these was launched with the approval of the Ministry of Health, and so could afford to put its finger boldly to its nose at its own trade censorship. The other two took the original course of appealing to the Watch Committees and Chief Constables over the heads of both Mr T. P. O'Connor and the showmen pledged to support him. The 'infant phenomenon' has all the luck. And her huge success is no doubt due, in part, to the fact that she had the foresight and audacity to stave off a State censorship by setting up one of her own, to which, when it runs counter to the enterprise of certain sections (as it does over propaganda films), she hasn't the slightest intention of deferring.

What strikes one chiefly about the films in question is the enormous disparity between their avowed moral purpose and the means adopted to achieve it. Granted that it be desirable that the adolescent should receive moral and physical instruction in regard to sexual matters, and be shown the sad results which attend evildoing, it is questionable whether such lessons should be given in a mixed assembly of both sexes. But, even if a case could be made out for that, we cannot conceive of any methods more mischievous and perverse than those employed by the producers and hawkers of these pictures. The stories, with the printed innuendoes which accompany them on the screen, are almost directly subversive of the real warning which ought to be conveyed. For all their high-falutin' asseverations and sordid trafficking in Scriptural texts, the dominant feeling that one carries away from such films as 'The End of the Road,'Damaged Goods,' and 'Open your Eyes,' is that if one cannot be 'good' one should be careful'-a hygienic counsel of some weight perhaps, but not a lesson that one is disposed to countersign from the strictly moral point of view.

Practically the sole interest in the story of The End

of the Road' is concerned with who has got, and who will get, venereal disease; and who will be cured of it, and who not. The reasons for condemning sexual promiscuity are founded on the deepest moral principles, yet these are completely neglected in the film. The appeal to idealism and purity of life is never hinted at. All that is left is a crude appeal to the emotions by as silly a story as it is possible to imagine; the total effect of which on the minds of the susceptible can only be to transform illicit sexuality into a speculative adventure which may have no bad consequences (for the man) if treated in the right way.

'Open Your Eyes' sets forth some of the awful consequences of venereal disease in the most revolting manner, and then seeks to tone down the effect of these by a feeble film charade which, for drivelling inanity, can never have been beaten since the early days of this invention. We are told at the beginning that it is time the 'moralist stood aside and the Health Officer rolled up his sleeves.' If the subject were not so serious the preliminary announcement, in conjunction with the performance, would be laughable. For, truly, the spectacle of the Health Officer rolling up his sleeves for a film is as ludicrous as that of Mr Snodgrass rolling up his for a fight. We have seen the moralist roll up his sleeves' in many a novel and play, but the result has never been so painfully comic as in the story unfolded in 'Open Your Eyes.'

The initial thesis of this absurdity is that, if parents educated their children in the mysteries and pitfalls of sexual contact, venereal disease would be stamped out. Two girls are introduced, one of whom is 'told,' and the other allowed to grow up in ignorance. The mother of the former (a girl of eighteen, by the way) takes her daughter aside, and proceeds to inform her on the recommendation of the family doctor-by what process she came into the world. Will it be believed that the illustration chosen, whereby to initiate the girl into the potentialities of sex, is that of a hen hatching eggs in a basket? With this knowledge the young lady is presumed to have been let into the secrets of her own physical nature, and to be henceforth secure from the temptations of man. The other girl's mother couldn't