These are fixed by stereotypes,
acquired from earlier experiences and carried over into judgment of
later ones. And, therefore, if the financial investment in each film
and in popular magazines were not so exorbitant as to require instant
and widespread popularity, men of spirit and imagination would be able
to use the screen and the periodical, as one might dream of their
being used, to enlarge and to refine, to verify and criticize the
repertory of images with which our imaginations work. But, given the
present costs, the men who make moving pictures, like the church and
the court painters of other ages, must adhere to the stereotypes that
they find, or pay the price of frustrating expectation. The
stereotypes can be altered, but not in time to guarantee success when
the film is released six months from now.
The men who do alter the stereotypes, the pioneering artists and
critics, are naturally depressed and angered at managers and editors
who protect their investments. They are risking everything, then why
not the others? That is not quite fair, for in their righteous fury
they have forgotten their own rewards, which are beyond any that their
employers can hope to feel. They could not, and would not if they
could, change places. And they have forgotten another thing in the
unceasing war with Philistia. They have forgotten that they are
measuring their own success by standards that artists and wise men of
the past would never have dreamed of invoking.
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