An Honest Debate.com

These are chapters 10 and 11 of my previously unpublished book on the birth of the American popular culture; From This Twisted Root: The Silent Movie Era and the Birth of the American Popular Culture.

The proposition that the movies produced by Hollywood during the silent era may have been a harmful influence on American society, is usually met with an incredulous smile. Looking back on the innocent looking films of the silent era, it is easy to laugh at those rabid ministers of yesteryear who used to cry out against these films and urge their congregations to boycott them. At the sunset of the century these movies, many of them artistic masterpieces, seem so innocuous that the very notion that such charming and harmless features could have played any role in undermining the morals of the nation seems absurd. But they did. 

The way in which even the most innocent seeming silent films played a role in undermining the moral foundations of the nation was wonderfully (though unintentionally) illustrated in the film, The Gods Must Be Crazy.

In the first part of this film an empty Coca-Cola bottle is inadvertently dropped from an airplane into a small pygmy village. Now, it is hard to imagine anything more harmless than a Coca-Cola bottle. However, to the natives, who had never seen such a thing before, its arrival had a profound impact. They quickly concluded that this object, the “strangest, most beautiful thing they had ever seen,” had been given to them by the gods, and they began to speculate as to their reasons for sending it.

Soon they found that it was a wonderfully practical item, and they were able to adapt it to many useful purposes. Before they knew it, this object, which had been unknown to them just a short time before, had become a necessity. Everyone “needed” it.  But, alas, the gods had made a cruel mistake, they had only sent one. This led to outbreaks of anger jealousy, hate and finally violence. Even the children of the “family” (i.e. tribe) fought over the bottle.

All of this trouble eventually prompted “Xi,” the leader of the family, to conclude that the bottle was an “evil thing,” and that if the family was to be saved from the corruption unleased by the bottle, it must be removed and thrown off the edge of the world. Having made this determination, he began an odyssey to the edge of the world to see to it that the “evil thing” was properly eliminated.

Of course, we know the Coca-Cola bottle was not really the problem. Its presence merely released aspects of the natives’ human nature that had remained dormant in its absence. In the same way the old silent films helped to awaken aspects of human nature that had lain largely inactive in America during the Victorian Age.

In his autobiography the great movie director, Cecil B. De Mille, acknowledges that something malignant began to infect the culture in post World War I America. He refers to this cultural sickness as “a crumbling of standards,” and he rightly puts his finger on the ultimate cause of it, “original sin.” But what he, and so many others since, have refused to recognize was that one of major reasons for this sudden outbreak of original sin was “the Coca-Cola bottle” that the gods of Hollywood had dropped into the civilization through their innocent looking movies. The process was gradual and all so very subtle that at the time most people did not even realize it was happening.

Griffith and Mayer write:  “As parents watched their young cultivate sideburns and spit curls, the more reflective among them came to a startled realization that the old molding influences – home, church, school – had been superseded by the silver screen. The rest wished they were young enough to be Sheiks and Shebas themselves.”

The Hollywood crowd — equal in influence with the home, church and school!? A more foreboding development can hardly be imagined. Sadly, the Hollywood crowd’s influence has grown into an even more potent force in recent years. But keep in mind, all of this enormous influence is not a new development, it was first noticed and felt way back during the “Silent Era.”

The legendary film director, Cecil B. De Mille, like many other Americans, could clearly discern that something significant was happening in America during the 1920s. He referred to it as a “cultural sickness” and argued that that it was being “aggravated in America” by something (he theorized the 18th amendment and the Volstead Act). But he did not recognize, at least early on, that his own films were one of the major factors in inflaming and spreading the cancer.

Richard Griffith and Arthur Mayer, in their very sympathetic history of the movies, write of De Mille’s contribution to the malaise, (though they do not acknowledge it as a sickness):  “It was De Mille’s peculiar insight that the strait laced Puritanism of prewar (W.W. I) was weakening and needed only to be given lip service to be placated. He dedicated his pictures to showing people, at length and in intimate detail what they ought NOT (emphasis in original) to do. His titles left do doubt at all of where his sympathies lay – `Don’t Change Your Husband’, `Why Change Your Wife?’, `Forbidden Fruit’…..but of course they had to be shown in order to be deplored.”

You may recall that in the wake of the controversy surrounding The Birth of a Nation D.W. Griffith had insisted that the movie industry had “no wish to offend with improprieties or obscenities, but we do demand, as a right, the liberty to show the dark side of wrong, that we may illuminate the bright side of virtue.” De Mille was, arguably, just trying to do this, to illuminate virtue by showing the dark side of wrong, unfortunately he failed to anticipate the attractive power the “dark side of wrong” would have on human beings who still suffered under the corrupting effects of “Original Sin” and who were just emerging from an era of “strait- laced Puritanism.

Griffith and Mayer write of De Mille’s films: “To a generation brought up never to mention personal sanitation, he introduced bathing as an art and disrobing as a prolonged rapture. In the shrine of cleanliness, dishabille and ever partial nudity were so obvious as necessity that the most godly could not object to their display on the screen….after generations of Puritanism, it was thrilling (emphasis added) to be told that bodily beauties were not a shame and a weakness.”   Historian Paul Sanns adds: “De Mille wielded the first megaphone on many of the scenes that made the movie bedroom what it is to-day.” Sann also quotes from Loyd Morris’ Not So Long Ago: “The De Mille boudoir became a chapel for the celebration of rites authorized by custom, but still accounted irregular by the law and the church.” This was one of the first ways in which the movies tended to undermine the moral foundations of the nation.

While Griffith and Mayer are correct in pointing out that the “godly” could not object to “dishabille” and “partial nudity” when connected with bathing, it is also true that it was not the sort of thing that America had been used to watching. Until the movies allowed the rest of the nation to join them, scenes like those featured in De Mille’s films had been reserved for “Peeping Toms.” By titillating the audience with the risque his movies were producing an appetite for it. The public was going to the theater anticipating a sexy scene or two and the films of De Mille and those who followed him were whetting a public appetite for voyeurism .

In another insightful passage form their history of the movies Griffith and Mayer discern a second way in which De Mille’s films served to undermine the values of society: “De Mille began his pictures where his predecessors left off, with the honeymoon over and the man and woman sitting down to dinner together night after night, pondering their bargain. Presently appeared the serpents in their shaky Eden. Villains or vamps they would have been earlier, on calculated malice bent, but De Mille showed them as unable to control their a actions, sincerely and fatally attracted to the married hero or heroine. Who, then was to blame for what followed?”

“As always, De Mille’s titles rebuked his plots. We Can’t Have Everything (1918), and the like upheld the sanctity of marriage and insured a last-reel return to the fold. But a territory had been explored [emphasis added] in the meantime. And the explorers seemed to be saying marriage had better turn out as advertised because there are, after all, second and third and even fourth choices.”

To a culture raised to believe that a person could, should and must control his actions, and that marriage vows meant what they said and were sacred, the propositions presented in these films, even though condemned, presented a different and seductively appealing viewpoint.  It was much like putting a wet paint sign on a park bench – which, for some mysterious reason seems to cause everyone who passes by to touch it – so the movies begin to affect the way the audience viewed sex and marriage.

Before long, and in ever increasing numbers, the public began to long for, and then to sample the “Forbidden Fruit” for themselves. Perhaps they thought that they could do what De Mille’s characters were never allowed to do, enjoy the fruit and avoid the consequences. These sorts of films were, indeed, a “Coca-Cola” bottle suddenly dropped into a society which had never considered, and certainly never watched, things like this before.

By 1922 De Mille had finally figured out that the “pleasure, freedom and excitements which his film has so relentlessly celebrated might constitute a decadence that would bring upon the republic the fate of Rome.” From that time on, Griffith and Mayer write, he set out to “reform the nation his critics said he had corrupted.”

It is to De Mille’s credit that he finally saw the effect that his films were having and tried to do something about it. However, his would prove to be a futile crusade. Ironically, this intensely moral man had shown the industry that America would pay to be titillated. The movie genre he helped create was steadily capturing the public’s imagination, and there seemed to be nothing that could stop it.

CHAPTER 11 – WINDS FROM THE OLD WORLD

So far we have focused primarily on the growth of the motion picture industry in the United States of America, but it should be remembered that all the while a motion picture industry was developing in the Untied States, motion picture industries were evolving in the various kingdoms of Europe as well. 

The evolution of film making in the old world, particularly western Europe, proceeded much differently than it did in America, but since European filmakers and films would ultimately have a significant influence on the American motion picture industry, the similarities and contrasts between the two are worth noting.

The first thing an American moviegoer who had only seen American films in American movie houses would have noticed, if he were to attend a movie on the Continent, would have been the difference in the place where the films were shown and in the audience that came to see them.

We have already seen that dreary nickelodeons were the first movie houses in America. Their intended audience was the urban poor. In contrast, European movie houses during this same era, “were usually located in fashionable districts and catered to the cultivated classes – the same patrons who attended the legitimate theater and the opera.”

Another significant difference that the man in the theater seat may have felt but probably would not have known had to do with the control of the medium.  In the United States the  independent producers who had wrestled control of the media away from the tycoons of the old M.P.P.C., had founded and became the heads of, powerful motion picture studios. But, like the men whom they had replaced, they were men of business. They were not artists, nor did they look upon motion pictures primarily as an art form. They looked upon the movies as entertainment and the folks who made them as entertainers, not artists.

The moguls of Hollywood did have a much greater respect for their enterprise and their audience than did their predecessors. But, like the men they had replaced, their primary concern was still making money, lots and lots of money. Thus, as long as they were in control, profits, rather than the making of artistic statements, would continue to be the principle reason for making movies.

The fact that the goal of every motion picture was to make money for the studio served as a check, a form of economic self-censorship which restricted American filmakers and prevented them from becoming too outrageous in their productions. It was all right to be slightly ahead of the pack, but if a film maker went too far, too fast, the public might quit coming and profits would suffer. If this happened often enough, a filmaker would find himself out of work. This was especially important at a time when the Jewish immigrants who ruled the studios were consciously trying to lift themselves and their industry to respectability. So as long, then, as the industry was ruled by this particular group of businessmen rather than by the creative community, the avant garde tendencies of the artists who worked in Hollywood would be held somewhat in check

The situation was far different in Europe. Motion picture historians Louis Gianneti and Scott Eyman write that “in most European countries, the cinema in its early stages of development fell into the hands of artists who shared most of the values and tastes of the educated elite.” Appealing to the masses or showing respect for the values of the middle class were the least of their worries. The primary goal of a European filmaker was to produce films that would make artistic and philosophical statements and films that would please their patrons, the intellectual and cultural elite of their various countries.

One of the results of this was that from the beginning, European filmakers have viewed themselves and were hailed by the cultural elite on both sides of the Atlantic as artists. In contrast, most of the pioneers of the American motion picture industry viewed themselves as did their bosses, entertainers. They considered the movies they made as a form of popular entertainment, not artistic statements. And the cultural aristocracy, who hailed their European counterparts, shared their opinion.

It was not that American filmakers were not artists in their own right. Giannetti and Eyman point out that “[D.W.] Griffith and his contemporaries had no great respect for the medium they were working in, but their temperaments compelled them to treat it as if it was an art. The result was that they made it one.” But they did not yet realize it, and the gentry did not want to acknowledge it. It would be years before their artistry was acknowledged and the intellectual community would come to celebrate the artistic merit of their films with anything approaching the enthusiasm they reserved for their European competition. But it would not take the filmakers in Hollywood very long to covet that recognition and status.

The acknowledging of the artistry of Hollywood was further hampered by the fact that most European filmakers, like the cultural elite they served, tended to look down on their American counterparts. To them, these Americans, who made movies primary to make money and to entertain the masses, were not being driven by true artistic motives and therefore were not worthy of the lofty designation, artists. As far as most European film makers were concerned, the American commercially-driven productions were “sell outs,” and, from an artistic standpoint, clearly inferior to their own endeavors. Giannetti and Eyman point out that “Whatever their individual merits or failings, American pictures were automatically suspect because even the most serious artists were required to work within commercially viable formats.”

Since the European film industry was controlled by artists who made their films to satisfy the sophisticated tastes of the cultural elite or just to please themselves, there were, of course, major differences in the content of European films when compared with American films of the same period.

European filmakers were living in a society that had been much more deeply impacted by the philosophers of the nineteenth century than had the United States, and their movies reflected this influence. They consciously set out to make films that celebrated the nihilism and pessimism that their philosophically informed world views invariably produced.

In contrast, the American filmaker might have been able to produce powerful films; but, once again, he was held back by the “bottom line” of the businessmen who controlled the studios and by the moral values of a society that was still predominantly Christian.  Because the great American middle class was still very much committed to a Biblically based set of values, American movie makers were forced, by necessity, to make films that, at least acknowledged the moral values of the Judeo/Christian culture in which they lived.

The contrast in the content of the European and the American products can be dramatically illustrated just by comparing “what was showing” in the theaters on the two continents, in any given year. For example, take the year 1928. In America moviegoers were flocking to the theaters to see the 1927 Academy Award winning film Wings starring Clara Bow and Buddy Rogers, or Al Jolson’s The Jazz Singer, (the first “talkie”). The same year European movie goers were being treated to the provocative work of two notable artists, Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali.

Bunuel and Dali teamed up in 1928 to create a surrealist masterpiece entitled, Un Chien Analuo. It was a daring and shocking film that blatantly emphasized sex and violence. Perhaps the most shocking scene of all is a sequence in which Bunuel himself slashes a woman’s eyeball in two. The film was full of images like this, images which defied logic and left the viewer to wonder what “deep truth” the film was trying to illustrate. The directors proudly boasted that it had no meaning at all.  It would be decades before an American filmaker attempted a work as bold or offensive as Un Chien Anuluo.

But when all was said and done, the more entertaining American movies would prove to be a much more powerful vehicle for impacting society with their messages, and in producing societal change, than were the self-consciously artistic European films such as Bunel and Dali’s masterpiece.

European films were basically “preaching to the choir,” and thus were not well-suited for making converts. American films, on the other hand, were designed to appeal to, to entertain, and finally to win over a mass audience. American films possessed that special ability to pull in individuals who, if they had known the philosophy that the filmaker was going to try to persuade them to accept, never would have gone the theater in the first place. Therein lay their power.

Whether the Europeans wanted to admit it or not, they were in competition with these popular and entertaining American imports. And, they were not winning the competition. In spite of the critical acclaim they consistently received, the artistic triumphs of the Europeans were to have very little impact on the culture. This was, no doubt, due to the fact that so very few people were bothered to go and see them.

European filmakers, who had been chiefly concerned with gaining the approval of their peers in the cultural elite, had made a mistake in not caring whether the mass audience enjoyed their films or not. And they paid for it. Erudite critics may have preferred the “arty” cinema of Europe, but the common man, and there were many more of them, embraced the light and optimistic American offerings. Given a choice of going to see Un Chien Analuo or Wings, it seemed that most people, regardless of nationality, preferred Wings.

So successful was the American motion picture industry that, even before war broke out in Europe in 1914, American films had moved into a dominate position in the industry. By the end of the First World War, Hollywood (assisted in large part by the devastating effects of the carnage in Europe), rather than Paris, Berlin or Rome, had become the movie capital of the world. America’s dominance of the media continued in the post war years. Within twenty years of the end of the war, American movies were showing on “over 80 percent of the world’s screens, and were more popular with foreign mass audiences than all but a few natively produced movies — even in Europe. In addition, as high as 40% of the money grossed by American pictures was earned in foreign showings. Whether the cultural elite applauded their efforts or not, the commercially-driven movie makers of Hollywood easily eclipsed their European rivals in popularity, impact, receipts, and eventually, in artistry.

The Europeans spoke with snobbish disdain of the commercially driven efforts of the Americans, but they could not help but notice the fame and the huge profits that were being raked in by their contemporaries in Hollywood. Once they began to notice, they could not help but covet the financial windfall that was being gathered by those they considered their inferiors. This soon resulted an exodus of talent from Europe to Hollywood as several noted European directors came to Hollywood seeking fame and fortune to go with their critical acclaim. They brought their artistic talents and their avant-garde philosophies with them. Both would have a significant impact on the American motion picture industry.

Meanwhile, in spite of their great financial success, their “star” status, and all that came with it, American filmakers were beginning to covet the critical acclaim being heaped upon the more eclectic films of Europe. They began to chaff under their designation as “entertainers” and covet recognition as “serious artists.” Increasingly, American filmakers began to feel stifled by the strictures placed upon them by the profit motivation of the studio chiefs who employed them, and by the conventions of American society. They began to yearn for the artistic freedom enjoyed by their counterparts in Europe. In time their yearning for critical acclaim and artistic freedom would lead to another battle for control of the cinema. This power struggle would be much more protracted and not nearly as obvious, or as nasty, as the battle between the MCCP and the independents, but it would be just as real.

The first serious skirmish in the battle by artists to assert their independence came as early as 1919 when director D.W. Griffith, actress Mary Pickford, and actors Douglas Fairbanks and Charles Chaplin, formed “United Artists.” Giannetti and Eyman point out that “this was not the fist attempt by actors to produce their own pictures and control their own professional lives, but by virtue of the stature of the people involved, it was certainly the most formidable.” Despite the modest success of “UA,” and similar efforts, it would be several decades before the artistic community would be able to gain control of the motion picture industry. It would not be until the 1967 that they were able to remove the last strictures on their creative freedom. With the removal of these restraints, Hollywood’s creative community finally gained the complete control and the freedom that their European counterparts had enjoyed from the beginning. The fine arts community, whether in America or on the continent, has generally tended to be avant-garde in its thinking and behavior, and it has always had some measure of influence in society. But motion pictures offered them the awesome ability to speak to and to sway the entire culture. Eventually the movies would be theirs to do with as they wanted. But in the early days of the motion picture industry, the strictures of capitalism and convention were still very much in place, and control of their medium and their goal of absolute artistic freedom lay far in the future. But artists are very clever people.

It has been said that if and artist can not afford canvas, he will paint on anything. If forced to work within strictures, an artist will quickly adapt and produce his art within the boundaries set for him. Often the product produced within these restrictions will prove to be the best and the greatest tribute to the artist’s genius. This would prove to be the case with the American motion picture industry.

The creative community in Hollywood hated the strictures placed on them by the commercial concerns of the studio chiefs and by the conventions of American society, but, in the final analysis, these restrictions proved to be a blessing in disguise. They had the unintended result of forcing American filmakers to learn how to be entertaining as well as artistic. This would ultimately give then an advantage, not just an over their European competitors, but a power over their audience and their critics as well. It is unlikely that they would have ever gained this edge had they not been under the control of businessmen and held in check by very exacting societal boundaries. It should always be kept in mind that it was when the motion picture industry labored under the constraints of free market capitalism AND an incredibly exacting moral standard that Hollywood enjoyed its golden age.