c unity were disregarded.

This unity is, first of all, the unity of action. The demand for it is
the same which we know from the drama. The temptation to neglect it is
nowhere greater than in the photoplay where outside matter can so easily
be introduced or independent interests developed. It is certainly true
for the photoplay, as for every work of art, that nothing has the right
to existence in its midst which is not internally needed for the
unfolding of the unified action. Wherever two plots are given to us, we
receive less by far than if we had only one plot. We leave the sphere of
valuable art entirely when a unified action is ruined by mixing it with
declamation, and propaganda which is not organically interwoven with the
action itself. It may be still fresh in memory what an esthetically
intolerable helter-skelter performance was offered to the public in "The
Battlecry of Peace." Nothing can be more injurious to the esthetic
cultivation of the people than such performances which hold the
attention of the spectators by ambitious detail and yet destroy their
esthetic sensibility by a complete disregard of the fundamental
principle of art, the demand for unity. But we recognized also that this
unity involves complete isolation. We annihilate beauty when we link the
artistic creation with practical interests and transform the spectator
into a selfishly interested bystander. The scenic background of the play
is not presented in order that we decide whether we want to spend our
next vacation there. The interior decoration of the rooms is not
exhibited as a display for a department store. The men and women who
carry out the action of the plot must not be people whom we may meet
tomorrow on the street. All the threads of the play must be knotted
together in the play itself and none should be connected with our
outside interests. A good photoplay must be isolated and complete in
itself like a beautiful melody. It is not an advertisement for the
newest fashions.

This unity of action involves unity of characters. It has too often been
maintained by those who theorize on the photoplay that the development
of character is the special task of the drama, while the photoplay,
which lacks words, must be satisfied with types. Probably this is only a
reflection of the crude state which most photoplays of today have not
outgrown. Internally, there is no reason why the means of the photoplay
should not allow a rather subtle depic