The French Villager Goes To The Movies

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 306, 17 March 1928, Page 28

The French Villager Goes To The Movies

(Written for THE SUN by CAPTAIN GEORGE CECIL.)

PARISIANS are apt to jeer at the village movies, contending that the films are ridiculous, the seats outrageously uncomfortable and the music a farce. Returning from the country, where pleasure or business has taken them, they recount various unforgetable experiences to sympathetic acquaintances, and, to drown the memory of the rural show, betake themselves to a super-expensive boulevard “cin6.” Here, incidentally, an inferior performance may be witnessed, for, if the tip-up chairs are well padded and the orchestra is passable, the films are sometimes so poor that no intelligent person can be expected to appreciate them. Indeed, the marvel is that a manager should have wasted money on hiring pictures which cannot be expected to draw. Certainly, the average village kinema is far from comfortable. Often as not the seats are painfully hard, while, even in the depths of winter, no attempt is made to heat the salle, so that every spectator is more or less frozen. The orchestra —usually a toneless and out-of-tune piano, a mere apology for an instrument, with, perhaps, an indifferently played fiddle to keep it company—makes a musical person shudder violently . . . There are, however, exceptions; one sometimes happens on a bucolic movie establishment at which the pianist is a player of real worth. Only last week, for example, your scribe, when “assisting” at a show in a tiny frontier village, heard Mozart and Schumann most admirably played by the local organist, who, unable to suffer the inept attempts of the operator's little girl, had volunteered to supplant her. And there are other instances. As to the films, they frequently surpass the vaunted Paris ones, since only acknowledged successes are shown. Of them more anon. No village in France possesses a regular kinema. The weekly Sunday performance takes place in the school room, the scholars’ rough benches serving as seats, or in a barn, which has been fitted up for the occasion. Should the village run to a public hall, this may, by special permission of Monsieur le Maire, be used, or an obliging caf6 proprietor, coming to the rescue, lends his none too commodious premises. Sometimes the motive power gives out, and an insufferably long wait ensues, during which the damage is made good. The villagers, by the way, do t not mind what Parisians very properly regard as an inconvenience—the opportunity

of taking a stroll and wetting their w’histles. Upon the village crier’s beating his drum, to warn the stragglers that the entertainment is about to recommence, the wanderers, greatly refreshed, return to their hard seats. All’s well. When the day of the performance draws near, no posters are displayed. The crier simply promenades the three or four streets forming the village, beats a roll on his deafening instrument, and bellows: “On Sunday evening, at the usual hour, and in the customary place, there will he a kinema representation! Immense pains have been taken to render it worthy of the most severe critics! The hire of the films has cost a fortune!” . . . The listeners grin, and, grinning, decline to believe a single word of the har-

angue, to which each is well accustomed . . . The adjoining farms and hamlets are notified by the postman and the baker while on their rounds. Quite a simple business. The performance invariably begins late, unpunctuality being esteemed a virtue in France. The casual operator probably is dallying with a plate of tripe (a much delicacy) when he should be preparing to operate. But nobody cares a sou where the fellow is. Eight o’clock, a quarter to nine, a quarter past nine are one and the same thing to a complaisant audience. Nothing matters

Despite the unfavourable Paris verdict, a* really inferior picture is rarely shown outside Paris . . . This autumn, “La Bataille” (that old but most thrilling film), “The Harpooner,” “Michael Strogoff,” “Peter the Great,” and others of equal value, which, after going the round of the townlets, are handed over to the village movie magnate, have enchanted countless audiences. “Madame Sans Gene” (with Gloria Swanson), the charming “Waltz Dream,” “Aloma,” “The Gold Rush,” which, in the French version becomes “La Ruee vers l’Or,” the highly-impressive “Les Miserables,” and dozens upon dozens which are worth savouring more than once, have lately delighted the villagers. The last-named, it may be noted, are no mean judges. Give them a poor thing, and they promptly demand their money back. And why not? Up till recently, Charlie Chaplin has been as popular as ever with the rustics. But owing to the obviously faked “Chariot” films, which some dishonest rascal has endeavoured to foist on the countryside, the once admired comedian is now in diminished request. “The Gold Rush,” and “The Kid” still attract; but in other directions “Chariot” fails to please. Harold Th° ?*>// f r ~"+. '

Lloyd, on the other hand, is a sure draw; so, too, is Douglas Fairbanks, whose gymnastic antics satisfy the populace. Most American films, in fact, whatever their nature, meet with the village critic’s approval. During the war, the possibly too sanctimonious Y.M.C.A. exploited one of the many Bunny efforts and “Cornin’ Thru’ th’ Rye.” These must have been left behind when the Y.M.C.A. packed up its traps and departed, for both were recently shown to a northern audience. Neither had any success • • • Paris.