Some religious painters of medieval times put in the picture itself phrases which the persons were supposed to speak, as if the words were leaving their mouths.  But we could not imagine Raphael and Michelangelo making use of a method of communication which is so entirely foreign to the real spirit of painting.  Every art grows slowly to the point where the artist relies on its characteristic and genuine forms of expression.  Elements which do not belong to it are at first mingled in it and must be slowly eliminated.  The photoplay of the day after tomorrow will surely be freed from all elements which are not really pictures.  The beginning of the photoplay as a mere imitation of the theater is nowhere so evident as in this inorganic combination with bits of dialogue or explanatory phrases.  The art of words and the art of pictures are there forcibly yoked together.  Whoever writes his scenarios so that the pictures cannot be understood without these linguistic crutches is an esthetic failure in the new art.  The next step toward the emancipation of the photoplay decidedly must be the creation of plays which speak the language of pictures only.

Two apparent exceptions seem justified.  It is not contrary to the internal demands of the film art if a complete scene has a title.  A leader like “The Next Morning” or “After Three Years” or “In South Africa” or “The First Step” or “The Awakening” or “Among Friends” has the same character as the title of a painting in a picture gallery.  If we read in our catalogue of paintings that a picture is called “Landscape” or “Portrait” we feel the words to be superfluous.  If we read that its title is “London Bridge in Mist” or “Portrait of the Pope” we receive a valuable suggestion which is surely not without influence on our appreciation of the picture, and yet it is not an organic part of the painting itself.  In this sense a leader as title for a scene or still better for a whole reel may be applied without any esthetic objection.  The other case which is not only possible but perfectly justified is the introduction of letters, telegrams, posters, newspaper clippings, and similar printed or written communications in a pictorial close-up the enlargement of which makes every word readable.  This scheme is more and more introduced into the plays today and the movement is in a proper direction.  The words of the telegram or of the signboard and even of the cutting from the newspaper are parts of the reality which the pictures are to show us and their meaning does not stand outside but within the pictorial story.  The true artist will make sparing use of this method in order that the spectator may not change his attitude.  He must remain in an inner adjustment to pictorial forms and must not switch over into an adaptation to sentences.  But if its use is not exaggerated, the method is legitimate, in striking contrast to the inartistic use of the same words as leaders between the pictures.