FILMS AND TOE STUDIOS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 862, 4 January 1930, Page 21

FILMS AND TOE STUDIOS

grand opera plans —

It i * predicted that, within two years, grand opera will he an accepted branch of screen entertainment. The more popular of the famous operas such as “Aida," *ll Troratore," and “Faust," will ye presented as films bp producers now experimenting with operetta and revue. Experts claim, however, that many of the "heavy" operas will never reach the screen in the traditional manner of the stage. The stories will require strengthening and tailoring to motion pictrtre specifications. In many cases the action will he heightened to produce greater intensity, and long scenes will he broken■ to avoid monotony. The players chosen will be more in keeping, physically, with the roles they are n tended to portray than has been possible in stage opera. Assuming that this prediction is an accurate one, picture goers may expect to be presented with opera that is interesting and entertaining dramatically, besides losing nothing of the musical wealth that, of course, is the sum and substance of any great opera. One of the reasons why grand opera has never appealed strongly to the mass of English-speaking people may be attributed to the tact that the action is seldom explanatory and the descriptive dialogue, whether in song or speech, is in a foreign tongue. Obviously film producers hope to overcome this difficulty by increasing the detail of the action to a point whereat the need for vocal explanation is reduced to a minimum If this can be accomplished without injury to either the vocal or instrumental music of the operas it will be. a great and far-reaching step in the popularising of the works of the great masters.