CAVELL FILM FARCE

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 323, 7 April 1928, Page 7

CAVELL FILM FARCE

SCREENINGS IN LONDON WHAT USE ARE CENSORS? By Cable.—Press Association. — Copyright , LONDON, Thursday. The Cavell film "Dawn” is to be screened at a leading West End cinema theatre from to-morrow onwards. The manager of the theatre says he obtained the film in the face of the most fierce competition ever known in the trade. This screening renders the position farcical. It means that although the Foreign Secretary, Sir Austen Chamberlain, personally disapproves of the film, although the German Foreign Office officially protested against it, and although the British Board of Censors rejected it "Dawn” emerges from the fierce public controversy and publicity unequalled by any film or play, with a free licence to be screened in every cinema theatre controlled by the London County Council. In other words, following upon its unprecedented advertisement the film comes to production virtually throughout London, while in the words of the producer, Mr. Herbert Wilcox: The manager of every available theatre is clamouring to obtain the picture. The consensus of opinion is that the County Council’s condition upon which the film could be shown (the cutting out of the incident of the shooting of Nurse Cavell by a German soldier) is not important and will in no way hinder the production. Everybody is asking: “What is the use of the censors anyhow?”—A. and N.Z.