PAGE EIGHTS

THE MICHIGAN DAILY

SUNUAY, NOVEMtsm zt, ,f .


PAGE EIGHT THE MICHIGAN DAILY SUNDAY, NOVEM~e.~ ci, r~'~

FOLLOW CODE & SYSTEM:
Dull Writers Cause of Fim

FILMS, MUSIC, FEATURES,
SPORTS, FASHIONS

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Weakness

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1954 ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN

n.

By WILLIAM WIEGAND
NOW THAT the novelty of Ciner-
ama, VistaVision and Cinema-
Scope is starting to wear off, some
motion picture patrons have start-
ed to wonder again what makes
.Hollywood movies so tiresome.
Hollywood itself is aware that
the widescreen boom is a tempo-
rary thing, and a few of the more
sensitive men in the industry, like
Dore Schary, MGM producer, and
Leon Shamroy, cinematographer,
have recently urged that it is time
to start thinking about sounder
scripts once more, or "story val-
ues," as they put it in California.
Despite what you may think, this
is not the first time it has occurred
to Hollywood that the writer is a
very important man. Still, this
worry has not appreciably im-
proved the quality of scenarios. Al-
though there are many, many oth-
er good reasons why American
movies are childish or pretentious
or just dull, the fact remains that
script weakness is one of the basic
causes of bad films, and this weak-

ness is ordinarily not the fault of
the Greedy Producers. For some
reason, it is the writers themselves
who are dull (even though they
will seldom admit it). Year by
year, producers discover they can
make money producing intelligent
films; and still writers use the
Code and the System as their whip-
ping boy. Good scripts are in de-
mand and yet the writers seem
helpless to produce them. Why?
Basically, I think there are two
reasons: one, the supply of good
novels, which was sensibly enough
always a major source of film
scenarios, is drying up, and two,
they have never been provided
with sufficient training in writing
original film scripts, I would like
to develop these points individual-
ly.
First of all, the three sources
for film scripts, with few excep-
tions, are plays, novels, and "or-
iginal ideas." The play, in spite of
a few reasonably good film adap-
tations, has seldom proved esthet-
ically sound as a foundation for

scenarios. The film is essentially
not a theatrical art, but a novelis-
tic one. The governing factor in a
stage play is its unity of time and
151ace. The playwright's energies
are focused on his limitations. He
knows the conventions which will
help him reach his objectives and
he uses them. The film is oppo-
site: Its raison d'etre is expan-
sion. It breaks down the walls; it
has a hundred points of view as
the stage has one; dialogue is its
crutch as it is the stage's back-
bone.
For these reasons and others,
adaptations of successful plays al-
most inevitably seem constricted
or gratuitously inflated; they smell
of entrances and exits, of useless
stylization, of lavender and left-
overs. In "Death of a Salesman,"
for example; on the stage, Willy
Loman was a man in shadow; on
the screen, he was the shadow of a
man. On the stage, the pathetic
ease with which he. stepped back
into the past was highly expressive
technique; on the screen, his rant-

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(ELL
Sportsman's favorite
find Viyella on the backs of America's nest .,
en on the ski trails of Sun Valley, the quail
Missouri and the surf casting beaches of the
c: J
tight woven combination of lamb's wool and
t cotton combines lightweight warmth and
caring softness to a most amazing extent
now have Viyellas in a thundering range of
ven patterns and rich solid colors from'
$13.50d
E-DOBBS HATS BURBERRY COATS
BOR DETROLT

ing reminiscences are lunatic be-
cause the film has a simpler way
of demonstrating a man's memo-
ries; the flashback. As in poetry,
you cannot really translate form
from one "language" to another.
The director settled for an approx-
imation. In the screen version of
the musical, "Brigadoon," a simi-
lar thing happens. The movie
shrouds the Shangri-la village in
phony mist; underneath is ginger-
bread. Everything that was half-
dream on the stage becomes a bru-
tal Technicolor reality. In Cinema-
Sdope, you get plaid all the way up
to the ceiling.
NTERESTINGLY enough, some
of the best adaptations of plays
("The Heiress," "Member of the
Wedding") have been of plays that
were originally novels. But even
more impressive perhaps is the
number of fine films that have been
translated directly from novels. I
doubt that Hollywood has produced
at any time since the inception of
sound a better film than Remar-
que's "All Quiet on the Western
Front," Hamnett's "The Maltese
Falcon," or "A Place in the Sun"
from Dreisser's "An American
Tragedy." All of these films cre-
ated their own world, expressed
both the tone and the dynamic
quality of the novel in film terms,
and they are, all three, master-
pieces. The variety and movement
of the novel, the social conscience,
the infinitesimal as well as the
mass effects are all within the ca-
pacity of the film medium. Holly-
wood has, in fact, often done' a bet-
ter job with the sprawling novel
they were far easier undertakings,
than foreign companies have. While
compare, for example, the effi-
ciency and general loyalty of re-
cent versions of "All the King's
Men" and "From Here to Eterni-
ty" with France's broad-stroked
adaptation of "Crime and Punish-
ment."
F, HOWEVER, the novel has
proved Hollywood's salvation,
it also seems to have imprisoned
her. The novel, virtually alone,
has supplied the American film
with its "ideas;" Hollywood her-
self has supplied only gimmicks.
This is true to such .a degree, in
fact, that the most talented writ-
ers in the business seem unable to
move on their own. John Huston,
for example, who has done bril-
liantly adapting such novels as
"The Maltese Falcon," "The As-
phalt Jungle," "Treasure of the Si-
erra Madre," and "The Red Badge
of Courage," becomes a cynical
clown, a gimmick-artist himself
when liberated from the dominion
of the sound novel: witness the re-
cent "Beat the Devil." He is a re-
markable interpreter, a poetic
translator, but, so far, not much
more.
Today, the sad fact is that the
classic novels have, been remade
so often, they are nearly exhausted
(although Huston himself is having
another whirl currently with "Moby
Dick.") The supply of good new
novels, meanwhile, is very low
for a reason it is not my province
here to investigate. In any case,
Hollywood is fresh out of ideas and
does not know where to shop for
them. -
This brings us back to their fail-
ure to develop any writers of sub-
stance in their own backyard. The
art of the original screenplay is
virtually dead. With few excep-
tions, film plots that originate in
Hollywood are "trick" comedies or
skeleton melodramas that will bor-
row the framework of scripts from
other sources, but contain no sem-
blance of the raw material that
holds the original together. The ex-
ceptions have come from men like
Joseph Manckiewicz who has net-
worked a warp of low-pressure so-
phisticatiodi with a woof of slick

character sense to produce nice so-
cial tapestries like "All About
Eve" and "Letter to Three Wives."
Occasionally, there also arises a
good lyric or ballad script .like
"High Noon," or there occurs a
creditable effort to lyricize a formu-

STo

Piston

VII
The
You'll
sportsm
fields of
Atlanti
This
Egyptia
hard-we
We
clear wa

la docu-melodrama, as in the cur-
rent "On the Waterfront."
But nobody dares to draft in
terms like Dreiser, or Remarque,
or even Hammett did. Yet what
they drafted made great {movies.
Least of all, does any film writer
approach his task any longer with
the effortless, but conscientious,
precision of the late Carl Mayer,
scenarist of many outstanding Ger.
man films. This is the way Mayer
wrote:
TITLE:
Summer-vacation time
Quick fade in
INT. R.R. STATION
Vacationtrains
Just leave.
Overcrowded with perspiring,
travelingrpublic.
Waving through windows.
Then: The trains have left.
One sees through tall, glass
arches
The city plaza in front of the
railroad station.
With highest houses,
Shops, automobiles, street cars,
Autobuses, elevated structure,
-people,
In hot asphalt vapor.
And in another scene:
Camerasomehow shooting down
upon the ground:
The place where they fought.
(Where they were lying in the
morass.)
But no one there now?
Only trodden-down reeds.
Traces left of the wrestling in
the mire . *
Review Discs.
Of Mozart

(Continued from Page 3)
listic monotony felt, and the fresh.
ness of this wonderful music re-
mains after many hearings.
The Second Concerto, written
in 1930-31, has elements of the
Baroque concerto grosso, of the
virtuosic solo work, of the almost
savage folk dance, and of the
'night music" reminiscent of Bar-
tok's Fourth Quartet, Out of Doors
Suite for piano, and other works.
The Third Concerto presents its
materials in remarkable straight-
forward fashion, but there is some-
thing strange and elusive about
this short, clear-cut work. It has
a peculiar esthetic quality that is
not quite like any other music by
Bartok.
If you stay long enough with this
concerto, you may come to feel, as
does your reviewer, that it is one
of the masterpieces of the half
century. The performance of both
works is superb.
Predictions,
3 Years Old,
A Little Off
(Continued from Page 6)
Slated to be first-string center
at the opening of fall practice his
junior year, a bad head injury put
an end to a fine football career.
Leo Schlict was rated along with
Veselenak as a capable end, but
the 6'4" flanker didn't come out
for football this year after seeing
little action for two seasons.
None of the other linemen that
Robinson mentioned those three
long years ago, including Bob Mil"
ligan, Carl Dubac, Cass Chomicz,
Jim Wagner, John Treadway, Carl
Lowrey, and Fred Caffrey, are
around any more.
The other eight seniors who
weren't deemed worthy of mention
as freshmen,.-but who are cur.
itntly holding down varsity spots.
are Jim Bowman, Don Drake, Pert
Gagalis, Carl Kamhout, Ray Ke-
nega;, Stan Knickerbocker, Joe
Krahl and Chuck Ritter.

I nter-wAr
By PHILIP B. TAYLOR
Assistant Professor
Department of Political Science
ON NOVEMBER 22, the nations of the
Organization of American States will
meet at Rio de Janeiro for an Inter-
American Economic Conference.
The Latins long have looked for the
chance to pin down United States eco-
nomic policy toward themselves, and this
meeting, first agreed to by the United
States in 1945, is now to occur after many
delays and quasi-evasions. One wonders
if the quite divergent viewpoints of
"North Americans" and Latin Americans
can be reconciled in principles and prac-
tices acceptable to both. For it is in the
economic area that inter-American rela-
tions are, .over the long run, worst.
Latin views toward the United States
are not merely those of the weak toward
the strong. They are, by the Latins' de-
finition, those of the poor toward the
rich, the cultured toward the uncultur-
ed, the idealist toward the pragmatist.
They are those of a people largely inex-
perienced and misled in the arena of po-
litical participation (and thus without
practical criteria for the Anglo-Ameri-
can notion of "democracy"), but bitter-
ly experienced in the ways of dictator-
ship, economic exploitation, and grind-
ing poverty. Born in Iberian feudalism
and Catholic fervor, the Latin plainly
does not understand the largely Protest-
ant, industrialized, politically democratic,
radical (and yet conservative) United
States.
To them we are Yanquis, past and pres-
ent exploiters, rich because they are poor,
slightly drunk with power and verging
toward fanaticism in our anti-Commu-
nism. But their principal complaint
against us is our overflowing generosity
toward Europe and Asia and our niggard-
liness toward themselves. A current Latin
American joke: a presidential adviser,
gloomily observing our massive aid to
Germany and Japan, suggests war on
the United States, because we are so gen-
erous to those we defeat. His chief ob-
jects: "Suppose we won?"
INTER-AMERICAN relations were pois-
oned early this summer by the Gua-
temalan affair. The handwriting had
been put on the wall at the 10th general
Inter-American Conference at Caracas in
March. Secretary of State John Foster
Dulles introduced, and secured the pass-
age of, a resolution condemning interna-
tional Communism ("[its] domination ..',
would constitute a threat to the sover-
eignty and political independence of the
American states . . .") by a 17-1 vote.
But it is significant that the nations
that sprang to Dulles' support were not
the democratic nations but the dictator.-
ships: Venezuela, the Dominican Repub
lic, Cuba, Paraguay among then. Guate-
inala's Foreign Minister Guillermo Tor-
iello, denouncing the Dulles proposal as
. . the Internationalization of McCar-
thyism, of book-burning and the impo-
sition of stereotyped thought," received
twice the ovation that Dulles did.
The New York Times' reporter, Sidney
Gruson, later put it succinctly: "Senor
Toriello had said many nasty things about
the United States that virtually all Latin
Americans believe." And after the' vote,
Uruguay, frequently a Latin bellwether,
said through its delegate, "We contributed
our approval without enthusiasm, with.
out optimism, without joy and without
the feeling that weswere contributing - to
a constructive measure."
This is not to say that Latin govern.
ments consider Communism.to be either
non-existent within their borders or with,

out menace. Most concur that it is both,
and Latin democrats frequently despair
of the frequency with which Communists
puccessfully join with reactionary na-

United Stat
the world, a
receive for
give them
necessary to
ing prices.
3) Guarar
able gigant
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private func
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ment prior'
and want n
and diplom
They would
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but would
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ernment's a
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is an ingen
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4) Guara
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the result o
main opera
nation. Thi
that privat
when it is
known Lati
is considera
American,
vousness. I
guarantee it
the uncerta
would the
the Latins
would beco
there were
5) Guara
--income o
Latin Ameri
6) Latins
ed technica
regard as a
millions we
Europe and
billions in g
just plain b
7) Lastly,
United Stat
permit then
pretense of
national tra
lieve that t
fectively co:
producers he
harm done'
MANY OF
good se
They smac
thing, and
inclined to
argument t
(or if he is
honest) is a
it would for
vities whic
--left to thi
But the I.
fight Comm
velopment,
would help]
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anti-Commt
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Latin Amer
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North Amer

Woodcut by Stu Ross
..FIGHT TOWARD ECONOMIC WELL-BEING . . .

tionalists to carry the day for dictator-
ship.
They feared the result would be inter-
vention, an all-too-real bogie they have
fought with moderate success since the
late 1920s when Herbert Hoover inaugur-
ated the attitude later- christened by
Franklin Roosevelt "the Good Neighbor
Policy." For the Latins it was largely a
matter of fearing the devil they knew,
The "civil war" in Guatemala in June,
triggered by the CIA announcement of
iron curtain shipments of arms, with
the United States arms shipments to
Honduras and an unofficial blockade as
reaction, was fought in a hothouse situa-
tion. Ambassador John Peurifoy virtually
abandoned , any pretense of diplomatic
impartiality, and gave currency to the
Guatemalan contention that this was
really nothing but a Yanqui-United Fruit
Company joint venture.
Guatemala took the' matter to the
United Nations Security Council. But Rus-
sia was the principal gainer, for United
States representative Lodge allowed him-
self to be maneuvered into the position
of attacker of the jurisdiction of the
United Nations, a Russian policy which
had received his scorn only scant weeks
before. Guatemala's Communist front
government was replaced by a none too-
savory reactionary one. But the prin-
cipal loser was the good name of the
United States. The end, for what it was

worth, had been used to justify thorough-
ly disreputable means.
AS WE GO to Rio, we find Latin eco-
nomic views relatively solidified. They
are the views of semi-developed, largely
one-crop nations which have had bitter
experience with the disastrous effects of
dollars-and-cents decisions by United
States corporation managers. Tnited
States housewives, for example, ark as
much to blame for the death of Presi-
dent Vargas, in a residual way, a-s any-
body else; the semi-boycott on coffee
precipitated a severe economic crisis
which provoked his action. And the
Latin views are also those of nations
which are highly socialized, and tend
to take it for granted that private capi-
tal and investment can be manipulated
by the state. In an economic sense, the
Latin governments are far freer of pres-
sure group influences in this regard than
is our own.
The Latins will demand several con-
cessions from the United States; and our
probable reaction can be anticipated,
1) Guarantees that we will purchase a
minimum quantity of raw materials an-
nually, and at a guaranteed minimum
price. We are committed to parity prices
for farmers, they argue; why not for
them as well. After all, they established
"crash" procurement programs for scarce
raw materials for us in World War II;

nerican Relations:Stockt
the least we
they are in
Lt esU.S.2) Guaran
To Ho/dable to thei
manufactur
To Hld Cnfernceprices, Toda

I

OXXFORD CLOTH]

ANN AR

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