THE FILM BEAUTY

Hokitika Guardian, 9 November 1927, Page 3

THE FILM BEAUTY

MISSING IN AUSTRALIA. (Australian & N.Z. Cable Association.) (Received this day at 10.15 a.m.) SYDNEY, Nov. 9. Giving evidence before the Film Commission, Robert Dexter, film editor and writer, said beauty was the merchandise of the motion picture, and Australia was practically barren ot beauty. Nature had made a wonderful job of this Continent, but as human beings, we were an ugly race. He declared there were quite a number of people in Sydney who could make a comfortable living in Hollywood, it they would onl\ look natural.

Referring to types seen in Sydney streets he had seen only one man whom the rest ol the world would accept as worth looking at on the screen in a leading role, and he was a newspaper reporter. For screen purpose, the Icatures of the Australian people were all wrong, and careless dross was another handicap. The best-dressed man in Sydney to-day could not hold his own with alive dollar extra man at Hollywood .

During the past year, there had been a possible eight girls in Australia who might have developed as acceptable screen players. Their tooth were naturally poor and they lacked much in that perfect physical development required for the screen.

In the matter of fashion, Sydney s women were twelve months belli ml New York styles. Australia was passing through a phase ol industrial development and until that was complete, she had neither time nor money to spare lor the cultivation of arts; lor the motion picture was an art and not an industry. He denied United States hail taken advantage of the war to oust England from the Australian film market, and added that if America dropped out of Australian business to-day, there would he sufficient pictures in England to supply Australian requirements lor one and a-lialf weeks only.