The trouble is
that some young writers, knowing that they are granted more license in
this direction when doing "Western stuff," make the mistake of abusing
this liberty. Mr. R.R. Nehls, of the American Film Company, says: "The
most noticeable fault with manuscripts dealing with Western life is
the natural inclination to run too much to gun play, stagecoach
robberies, etc. Please remember that we do not wish to distort
conditions in the great West--rather we seek to portray it as it
really exists today."
Mr. Nehls, it will be noticed, says "the great West ... as it really
exists today." It should be apparent to any writer that in turning out
stories of the present-day West there is even less excuse for
promiscuous gun-play than in a story, say, of California in the days
of the Forty-Niners. But Indian massacres, soldier warfare, Indian and
cowboy fights, usually come under the head of "historical" subjects
and are therefore permissible.
_5. Plays Offensive to Classes of Patrons_
It seems scarcely possible that any intelligent photoplay writer would
introduce into one of his stories an incident calculated to offend the
religious or political faith of any patron, and yet in the past
different pictures of this kind have been the cause of more than one
unthinking moving-picture theatre manager's losing some of his best
patrons.
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