A FILM IN MOSCOW
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—The article entitled " A Film in Moscow " has been forwarded to me, and I, having also seen this film, feel bound to protest at the facetious method adopted by your cor- respondent in criticizing the film. Any play, book, or work of art can be made to look ridiculous if treated in a flippant manner, and it seems to me that your correspondent resorts to the cheapest kind of dramatic criticism.
The film, it is true, is melodramatic, and no one is more aware of this fact than the Russians ; it also makes far too great use of the purely accidental in telling a story of the typical ; but the photography, the synchronization of the sound and the general arrangement of the film are undoubtedly good. The emphasis given to the education of the children, with which your correspondent finds fault, seems purely in accordance with the subject of the film, which is the " way
to life " and not the degraded lives of the homeless children before the work of reclamation began.
The real points of–criticism, the excessive utilization of the accidental and the melodrama, have been entirely over- looked by your correspondent, who, by his methods, could make Hamlet appear the most futile drama ever written.— I am, Sir, &c., P. A. SLOAN. Technikum of Foreign Languages, 9 Sretensky Botdvard, Moscow.
[We would point out that Mr. Fleming's article was printed as a literary article, and not as a film review. No fault was found with the education.—En. Spectator.]
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