FILM CHRONICLE
459
really know and are sure of can express by the means or the genre of
means, and the kind of feelings, that belong to
him.
Again, by the un–
ashamed representation, once he has withdrawn the irony from them, of
the
very same sentimental ideals
which are tearful
and
funny in
The
Vagabond, The Kid, Modern Times.
To say this rather wickedly, many a
spectator might think that the ecstatic last close-ups of Miss Goddard aren't
so pretty as all that, but there is not the least doubt that Charlie thinks
she is just beautiful. So, to return to the celebrated Message-speech at the
end of the film: it does not seem to me, as it did to most others, that he
here steps "out of character''; on the contrary, this speech is just the char–
acter of the Jewish Barber (who was at no moment made unrestrainedly
funny) . The speech is too long, it is not even well spoken thruout; but
when he says, "We think too much and feel too little" and "Now we must
fight!"-we know that the context for the truth or falsity of these proposi–
tions has been fairly given to us by the speaker; if this isn't meant from
the heart, we have been deceived for 25 years.
A SILK PURSE, A SOW'S EAR
With the appearance of the 3rd, and perhaps last, number of the
Filnu
of Mssrs. Kirstein and Leyda, it is not amiss to make some comment. But
what I have to say, I fear, comes down only to this: It doesn't seem pos–
sible to have a serious magazine ()f the films when there are no films.
Could one fill a contemporary literary magazine if the whole of literature
were the
Saturday Evening Post
and, once a month,
Harpers?
On the credit side, there obviously should be a serious film periodical
and
Films
is serious (60c a copy) . In the absence of cinema in the thea–
tres, it has printed some interesting scenarios, e.g. Gorki's notes for
The
Lower Depths
or James Agee's
Man's Fate.
In the absence of films, too, it
has devoted itself mainly to sociology: why are there no films? and, what
is the social effect of what there is?
But the attempt to sociologize about trivial nonsense must inevitably
give rise to the following thoughts: Where no novelty or problem is given
by the objects, any original or creative ideas must come from the critic (as
Kenneth Burke, e.g., could write amusingly about Nelson Eddy) ; then,
Why bring in
these
objects at all? What, for instance, are we to say of 14
long pages (in No. 1) about Films at the Fair? Why discuss censorship
(like Mr. Falk) if we are to emerge with the guiding principle of "Lin–
colnism," namely "To do justice, to love Mercy, and to walk humbly with
Thy God''? It is not, of course, that social ethics are insignificant, but
why debase them in the context of bad movies? to do so is to dabble in
just the hogwash of Adler's
Art and Prudence.
The fact is that political
discussions of art have an effect only on persons vitally interested in art,
and no such person is interested in these little items. But the piece de resis–
tance is to find an issue (No. 3) devoted to Pan-America!
If
to speak
