American Cinematographer - December 1940 - 34

and tlie
Amatemnds
Conceiotion
By BILL SEINEKE, J r.

R

ECOGNITION of documentary by
the theatergoing: public has been
a crystallization as sudden as
Johnny's falling in love with the girl
next door who quite as miraculously
graduated overnight from pigtails and
freckles into something feminine and
wonderful.
Like the girl next door, documentary
pictures have been with us for a good
twenty years. Average movie fan has
come home from the theater more than
once and remarked, "Saw an odd pic¬
ture tonight. Sort of makes you think,
seeing that kind of picture. Oh, it was
about fishing fleets. D'you know, though,
when I open a can of tuna from now
on I'm going to get an extra thrill."
Average movie fan has called such
pictures movie fill-ins, travelogs, trips
through various kinds of industrial
plants and most anything to which he
could lay his tongue except, until recent¬
ly, documentaries.
Dazzled Listeners
Even now he hesitates to employ the
word to describe a type of motion pic¬
ture, though the temptation to dazzle
listeners with the casual use of an im¬
portant sounding term is not easy to
resist.
Apart from its proper application by
;inematographers to the kind of film it
is, documentary has crept into the con¬
sciousness of laymen and many ama¬
teurs chiefly through mediums only par¬
tially informed. The result has been
a misunderstanding as dangerous as
complete misinformation.
Who's responsible ? A few self-styled
movie critics, for one group. The other
group is the reading and listening pub¬
lic, whose apathy to any evolution is
deplorable until that which has evolved
assumes skyscraper proportions. Yes,
the girl next door is back from college
562

December, 1940 *

and gosh! her freckles are gone and her
hair is all done up!
In the first place, the pictures pro¬
duced for entertainment purposes with
historical backgrounds have been ex¬
tolled as documentaries and publicized
as the current popular trend in cinema.
Whether or not they deserve the classi¬
fication is perhaps a matter of opinion.
Documentary on History
Perhaps it is drawing too fine a line
to say that these have not been true
documentaries, but did possess docu¬
mentary characteristics. In order to ar¬
rive at an exact understanding of the
word, however, it may as well be pre¬
cepted at once that the approach to the
creation of an entertainment film just
about sinks its chances to rate as a
documentary.
This does not absolutely preclude en¬
tertainment features from the other
classification, but when one does receive
acclaim as a documentary you may call
it luck or the demonstration of a re¬
markable talent on the part of the
writer or the director or the editor.
Well, we ask impatiently, why can't
an ordinary good historical drama get
into the documentary class ? It's history,
isn't it ?
History it is. And a number of other
things. Drama, for instance. Now drama,
in order to be good, has to move swiftly
and its inevitable corollary is distor¬
tion. It must appeal to our emotions
because we are seeking diversion or
distraction. We are feasting our senses
upon oomph men and women; more
often than not we attend movies to see
them.
Theme Is Vital
As for the picture itself-it's merely
something to enable us to live their por¬
trayals vicariously. All of which is not

AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER

to take a poke at the star system. We
simply strive to expose an attitude of
mind that causes us to expect certain
things of pictures. And it follows natu¬
rally that producers have tapped our
attitudes for exactly what they're worth
in theater admissions.
People aren't important to documenta¬
ries except as they relate to the under¬
lying theme. Theme is vital. It is the
drumbeat, the rhythm, the coordinated
skeleton of documentary.
Yes, the cinema has always spelled
entertainment. There was a time when
anything but entertainment at the movies
bored us. That time is irrevocably past.
A new attitude is shaping in Mr. and
Mrs. Average Movie Fan, because they
are asking more questions than ever be¬
fore. Questions that get at the root of
things.
Definitely New Attitude
They want to know what makes ma¬
chines tick and wheels go 'round. They
don't look scared any more when some¬
one mentions relativity, and atomic
power and U-235 are mysteries they
feel they're entitled to understand be¬
cause someday, they declare, smashed
atoms may run automobiles and that
would obviate the use of gasoline and
we wouldn't have to worry about ex¬
hausting natural resources and what a
wonderful world we may live in! Defi¬
nitely a new layman attitude.
The attitude is father to the appetite
and the appetite must be satisfied. There¬
fore motion pictures are performing more
or less new functions on a grander scale
than in their embryonic past.
They are educating our children as
well as ourselves; they are reporting
factual, contemporary history; they are
propagandizing; they are analyzing and
parading before our eyes and minds the
pulse beats of men, machines and mod¬
ern miracles. They are documentary.
All this hasn't just happened . . . like
that. Any number of factors are respon¬
sible: radio, better educational facilities,
better highways, cheaper automobiles.
More responsibility and greater credit
are traceable, however, to the doorsteps
of the pioneers in documentary.
Men Who Rank
Mary Field, Robert Flaherty, John and
Marion Grierson, Joris Ivens, Stuart
Legg, and Basil Wright are but a few
of the individuals who will forever rank
among the great documentalists of the
era in which they have lived.
Paul Rotha, himself a producer of
documentary, has written a book entitled
"Documentary Film." This is no book
review, but amateur cinematographers
are strongly advised to read the work
if their aims embody the making of
purposeful pictures that endeavor to es¬
tablish some comprehension of the fac¬
tors of civilization today.
All very well, you say, for the pro¬
fessional brotherhood. Quite all right
for students able to enlist the aid of
practitioners of the abstract sciences,
American Cinematographer - December 1940

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - December 1940
