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RADIO-TV

Stars of silent screen on CBUT

HERE'S .a number of cynical

jokes:'in circulation about the
age of many films shown on
television in North America,
though genuine criticism of
such films. should: ideally be
based. on their quality rather
than their antiquity.

However, there is on Channel
2 a weekly program unashamed-

ly devoted to showing films any-
where from 30 to 60 years old.
This . program is
Museum, seen every Wednesday
at 6:30 p.m. and it has been

divided into two parts — a
“feature” and a “short.”

The “feature” consists of ex-
cerpts from films by directors

Movie ~

_Stars of the silent screen are becoming known to the younger generation as their old
pictures are shown on TV. Shown above are (from left) Dorothy Gish, Lillian Gish, Beatrice
= and Nité Naldi, who met recently in New York at a CBS” radio show.

such as D. W. Griffith, Edwin
S. Porter, Donald Crisp and

Mack Sennett, and their stars -

are the greatest of the flicker-
ing, silent screen — Mae Marsh,
Robert Harron, Mary Pickford,
Rudolph Valentino, Lillian
Gish and Lionel Barrymore, to
name but a few.

People of the Potlatch program
to be repeated on Channel 2

mF cost ERS who missed
the CBUT film on the
Vancouver Art Gallery ex-
hibition, People of the Pot-
latch, and those who wish to
see it again, will have the
opportunity when the film is
given its second showing on
Channel 2 at 7.30 -p.m. on
Tuesday, May 15. People of -
the Potlatch was produced
by Daryl Duke, with camera
man Wally Hamilton. Film
editor, Arla Saare. The com-
mentary was written and
spoken by Bill Reid. Here
is what the CBC Times. has

to say about it.
ae, ee

HEY could carve a sixty foot

ocean-going boat from one
tree trunk, or mould a spoon

from a mountain sheep’s horn,
or spend two years weaving in-
tricate mat designs which they
dyed in blues and yellows made
from hardwon pigments. Their
tools were simple — the only
weaving instrument the women
had was a. plain stick from
which the yarn hung — but
they had plenty of time, and
plenty of wood to carve.

Then the whiteman came. He
brought whiskey and guns and
bibles and disease. The native
social life crumbled and with
it the desire and ability of the
Potlatch Indians to maintain
their own arts. Now their
civilization is dead.

Too often West Coast people

have been unable to see more’

of the native culture than a few
gaudily and falsely painted
totem poles. Consequently, ap--
preciation and knowledge of
Indian art is not as wide as it
could be. An exhibition, People
of the Potlatch, shown recently
at the Vancouver Art Gallery
was designed to give that ap-
preciation and knowledge.

A young schoolteacher who
‘was showing some of her charges
around the exhibition was asked

why a memorial pole had on it
a series of rings. “That’s just
to separate the different sec-
tions of the carving,” she replied.

The remark made Bill Reid,
CBC announcer, whose mother
was a member of the Haida tribe,
‘wince. “I don’t suppose they
can be expected to know that_

sort of thing,” he said. It turned °

out that the top of the pole
represented the hat of the chief
the number of rings denoting
his rank.

“There are only a few of us
left who try to reproduce the
old arts,” Bill Reid. explained.

“Mungo Martin in Victoria is
a genuine link with the great

- earvers of the past. I do some

jewellery, and there are one or

two others. But we are groping |

into the past. We don’t know
the significance of much of the’
design.”

Sometimes it is difficult for
the white person to catch the
very real beauty of these Indian
works. The art is alien to him
—or rather, he is alien to the
art.

For the Indian art to be ‘ap-
preciated as art, and not just
for its curiosity or historical
value, a knowledge and sympa-
thetic eye is necessary. But
CBC cameras can lend viewers

* great

that knowledgeable eye ina way
that no number of words can.

The camera can show what
Bill Reid, who wrote and nar-
rates the script, means when he
talks of “the moody quality of
the carvings, the feeling of
strength restrained in
static form.”

Lighting and cameras in im-
aginative hands bring into strik-
ing relief the characteristic eye-
shape which Bill Reid thinks is
the basic pattern in Potlatch
art. As one person remarked
after seeing the CBC film, “You
know, I walked right round
that exhibition but I didn’t
even see it.”

Gans od

The film also shows pieces
going back 3000 years when a
people, of whom little is now
known, sculptured from stone
massive bowls decorated with
human and animal figures. These
bowls are always found alone,
never with other objects. Were
they sacred, to be used by none
other than the holy men of the
tribe ?

First this pre-historic culture,
then the classic period. Finally,
a short but violent outburst of
virile art which the new v wealth
stimulated.

But the outburst did not last
long. Maybe the Potlatch cul-
ture had reached its peak and
was incapable of further devel-
ment anyway.

“Well, it is all over now,” Bill
Reid has said. ‘We can only
look at what they produced and
perhaps feel a deep regret and
maybe a little shame that such
a culture should have been al-
lowed to disappear so com-
pletely, practically during our
lifetime.”

HEALTH

Air pollution factor
in cancer, bronchitis

LOT has been written in
A recent months about air pol-
lution and cigarette smoking
and their effects on health.

There are rival theories about
whether cigarettes or diesel
fumes cause lung cancer; and
there is the question of the
effect of atmospheric conditions
in causing chronic bronchitis,
with the special and mortal
effect of “smog”.

As for lung cancer, it may
be a mistake to put it down
either to cigarettes or diesel
fumes or any other single factor.
It might be wiser to suppose
that two or three or several fac-
tors operate together, their ef-
fects being additional or com-
plementary to each other.

All this remains to be proved.
In the meantime it seems highly
‘probable that cigarettes have
something to do with it, and
quite possible that general at-
mospheric pollution — includ-
ing diesel fumes — has some-
thing to do with it too.

* * *

The facts. about chronic bron-
chitis are less widely known.

According to the British
Medical Journal, one fact, esta-
blished only in the last few
years, is that in most cases of
chronic bronchitis there is no
infection by a germ, even in
winter.

It is becoming more and more
obvious that the purity of the
air we breathe is the important
factor. Pure air is necessary for
life and it is also harmless. But
we polluté the air and then it
is still necessary for life but ‘no
longer harmless.

Smoking plays a big part in
this. Chronic bronchitis is com-
moner- among smokers and
particularly heavy | smokers,
than non-smokers. It is just as

common among women smokers
as men smokers.

“Smokes like a chimney!”
Now let us see how the chim-
neys come into it. uP:

Most people know that 4,000
people died in London in a few
days in December 1952 simply
because of the smog that “hap-
pened” then. It is now’ known
that 1,000 more died in January
of this year, from just the same
cause.

Eee Saree

The total effect of less catas-
trophic conditions is almost as
terrible. Mortality from chronic
bronchitis is higher in industrial _
areas than in the country, is
higher among the poor than
among the wealthy, and is high-
er in places where there is much

sulphur dioxide in the air (re-

gardless of wealth or poverty,
good houses or bad).

The same is true of areas
where there is a high consump-
tion of domestic coal per acre.

“ When we read that more than
five million tons of sulphur di- —
oxide (a notably irritant sub-
stance) and three million tons
of smoke, grit and dust are dis-
charged annually into the air
over Britain and that “mortality
from bronchitis in England and
Wales is 20 to 50 times greater
than in Scandinavian countries,
where little coal is burnt,” we
can see the extent of the pol-
lution.

The British Medical Journal
says that “abolition of atmos-
pheric pollution may prove to
be the most important single
factor” in bringing about a re-
duction in chronic bronchitis,
and it is not difficult to believe.

It seems quite likely that
chronic bronchitis is above 2
a disease of industrial capital-
ism. This particular form of s0-
ciety pollutes the air literally
as well as metaphorically. Per-
haps, in order to get cleaner air
it will be necessary to produce
a cleaner form of society.

Palme Dutt on India

TUDENTS of India and Asia
the world over will welcome

the publication of India Today

-and Tomorrow, a thorough his-

torical survey by R. Palmé Dutt.

Palme Dutt gives a picture
of the fundamental ideas and
cbjectives behind the changing
policies of both the British rul-
ers and the Indian National
movement.

He shows how, from the end
of the First World War, the
clash between the two became
sharper and sharper, with the
mass of the Indian people tak-
ing an ever more important
part in their long struggle for
independence, until today their
viewpoint is starting to dominate
the whole political scene.

Particularly important is his
analysis of the reasons behind
the partition of India in 1947,
the historical background to the

Hindu-Moslem conflicts and the’

establishment of Pakistan, and
his assessment of the natural
and linguistic question in India.

The emergence of the Indian
Communist party as a power! |
ful national, electoral and polit-
ical force, becoming capable of
challenging the domination of
all existing traditional parties:
is well described.

Dutt points out that the Nehru
government is now playing a
part of vital importance in the
fight for world peace; but. that
“there are still unresolved con-
tradictions between the progres~
sive external orientation and the
internal political situation.”

The book suffers a little from
being abridged from the earlier
India Today, being forced 1
concentrate its wealth 0°
material into too short a spac&

But its vivid and readable
account of the background 10
the tremendous movements noW
gaining such rapid ground in
India and Asia will be °
enormous help to our fight for
a true understanding of the a5-
pirations of the Indian people: —

JOHN ALEXANDER ~

MAY 11, 1956 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE — PAGE 8