FILM CENSOR NOT A PICTURE FAN

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 65, 3 April 1937, Page 13

FILM CENSOR NOT A PICTURE FAN

A quiefc evening at the pictures is about the last thing you want to suggest to a film censor if you want the party to remain friendly (says a Wellington writer). It is the sort of thing that is liable to make him wince and turn pale and show you the door. And why not? After all, a film censor is entitled to feel a little sensitive about a thing like that. Life for him is just one good, bad, or indifferent picture after another good, bad or indifferent picture, and a night out at one of the local picture theatres by way of relaxa.tion isn't his idea of a good time. He sees more pictures than even the most rabid picture fan in the country could possibly see, and the Clark Gables and Greta Garboes and the Jimmy Durantes and all the rest of the dazzling company so far as li© is concerned, are not creatures to be admired and glorified. They are just part of hds job. And so long as they behave themselves on the screen he is quite satisfied. Mr W. A. Tanner, New Zealand film censor, admits that he is not keen about godng to the pictures, in the accepted sense of the term. He "goes" to the pictures five days a week. He is the man whose name you see signed on the certificate attached to every picture, large or small, that flashes on the screen. He lias his own picture show^a one-man picture show, on the fourth floor of a tall building in Courtenay Place. And every picture that comes into the country is first of all released in this private projection-room, with its, specially constructed screen and heavily curtained sides. At a small table, with a shaded red reading lamp bent over it, sits Mr Tanner, with an open book in front of him and a pencil in his hand, keeping a critical eye on the picture as it is recorded on the screen at the far end of the room. Next to him sits a "Post" reporter, and on the screen Ronald Colman and company perform for the benefit of a small, but — at least, as far as one of them concerned — a highly critical audiene. The reading lamp is not alight the whole time. At various intervals, Mr Tanner reaches behind him and flashes the red light for a moment as he makes some note in the diary in front of him. This is a twelve-thousand-foot film, and as this flashing on of the light and the scribbling of notes proceed, the curiosity of the newspaper man reaches almost bursting point. Every body in the picture behaved properly. Mr Tanner leans over. and explains. A Regular Check. "If you keep a close eye on the picture you will see every no^ and again a black or white dot in the corner," he remarks. "That occurs about every eight hundred feet,- and marks the end of a section. I make a note of it as is .passes, as it makes it much easier for me to check up on any cutting that is.necessary when I know which section requires to be cut, particularly in a long picture like this one." On goes the picture — a good picture, too. The red lamp flashes at intervals. Ronald Colman dmdes to fall in love with the eharming heroine, and he does his courting like a gentleman. does a . little vigorous work with his fists. There are some really first-class sliots of mhuntain photography. Then comes the moment of the Big Decision. And every thing ends nicely.