Page:Screenland October 1923.djvu/9

SCREENLAND

Even blasè New York marveled! When this dainty Senorita who had come from sunny Spain to make her American film debut, stepped oil the liner, spontaneous exclamations of wonderment came from the welcoming throng. At the docks—hotels—and studios—all wondered at the saintly beauty of the complexion of this great Spanish film star.

HESE studies set new standards of grace and beauty for art work. They were made for artists, sculptors and students.

Book of 28 reproductions, $1.00.

Six sets—A to F—rarely beautiful photographs, eight photos to a set now ready.

metropolitan life than from one living in the heart of publication competition. Big business, in a word, made a drive for the small town reader. That drive is still continuing. The mail pouches are full of magazines that are dropped on every rural and small-town doorstep, and they are getting fuller every day.

the same time that the literature of the country made its inroad into the life of the hitherto secluded family, the movie took its place as an educational factor in the community. I am considering education from the point of view of publicity, from the point of view, if you please, of the merchant who believes that customers need to be educated to their wants. It is not a narrow point of view. Raising standards of living has long been the goal of the educator. That the merchant profits by this is merely a fortunate corollary.

"Take the farmer's wife or the small town housekeeper who goes to the movie show to see the latest episode in the Perils of the Pure. The perils mean something to her, and so does the purity, but the things that make as great an impression are the things the heroine wears and the furnishings of the home she lives in. To the movie patron they are the essence of social lite and form. Imitation is the greatest principle in the theory of education; and hope springs eternal in the human breast. When the farmer's wife or the small town housekeeper comes home, she looks over her wardrobe, she looks around her house, she draws comparisons and she makes mental reservations. It is on the strength of these reservations that our business depends, to a great extent."

is expected from Douglas Fairbanks' new production, The Thief of Bagdad. Great sets have been erected on the ten acres recently added to the Pickford-Fairbanks studios, and, according to Fairbanks, The Thief of Bagdad will begin where Robin Hood left off. "Our plan." said Fairbanks the other day, "is to choose players who are the living counterparts of the illustrations of the 'Arabian Nights.' One of the unusual sets will have for its base a concrete floor covering two acres. According to what I have heard the cement work will cost $20,000. Around the floor, which serves as a sort of plaza, will be the bazaars of Bagdad. Other sets, the foundations for which are now being laid, will tower above 'Robin Hood' castle, dwarfing it to quite ordinary proportions."