Life, 1914-05-07 · page 28 of 52
Life — May 7, 1914 — page 28: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a critical review of the film "Neptune's Daughter," starring swimmer Annette Kellermann. The page satirizes Hollywood's wasteful approach to filmmaking. **The Critique:** Life argues the film had exceptional raw materials—Kellermann's athletic talents, Bermuda's exotic scenery, lavish sets, and costumes—yet failed artistically. The review condemns the movie as a "hodge-podge" mixing real scenes with cheap melodrama and poorly plotted story. It critiques excessive, rapid scene-cutting and unflattering close-ups of Kellermann's facial expressions. **The Satire's Point:** Life mocks producers for having money and resources but lacking artistic vision or coherent storytelling. Despite these flaws, the magazine concedes the film will likely succeed commercially—the joke being that spectacle and star power matter more to audiences than actual dramatic quality or cinematic art. The cartoon accompanying the text (showing a woman on what appears to be a bicycle or vehicle) likely reinforces this theme of misguided entertainment priorities.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Getting Along Towards the End MEP Bin proof of Lirz’s recent —— statement that there is a need of artistic brains in the moving picture business could not be provided than that to be found in the elaborate picture play called ‘ Neptune’s Daughter", with Annette Kellermann as the star and produced at a Broadway theatre of the standing of the Globe. In this entertainment we have all the Gg, essentials of moving picture im- LEN pressiveness except the brains nw to use them with artistic re- sults, To begin with, there is Miss Kellermann herself, with her exquisite figure and her abilities in the swimming and diving line and some acquaintance with dancing and fencing. For a setting there is provided the picturesque back- ground of Bermuda’s sea, sand, rocks and caves, to say nothing of its clear atmosphere for achieving the best photo- graphic results. These films show, too, that Bermuda also has palatial and other architecture for picture purposes. The backers of the enter- prise have evidently not been niggardly in expenditure for a numerous supporting company and for costumes and other accessories. M7 BOB © LL. this wealth of material, much of it absolutely novel, would have been a tremendous inspiration to a drama- tist with imagination, constructive ability end even an cle. mentary knowledge of the mechanical and optical possibilities of the moving picture. Whether he had chosen to follow the line of poetry, allegory, melodrama or even farcical comedy, he could have made a picture play entirely outside of and beyond the possibilities of the theatrical stage. With a cogent plot and the utilization of the great material he could have brought before the eyes of his audiences a story that would not only excite the wonder of the unthinking and uneducated, but a veritable work of art to appeal to the most critical and cultured spectator. What is the actual result? “Neptune's Daughter” is a hodge-podge in the way of a complicated story in which the real and the crudely fanciful are jumbled up with cheap melodrama to the point where the most attentive watcher is at a loss to know what it is all about. What should have been a really remarkable picture-drama is made simply a show. In some ways Miss Kellermann’s unusual abilities are used to advantage, but among the wasteful diversions, both in time and film space, are numerous exhibitions of her facial expressions which are not especially attractive. The silly plot involves the most inartistic, frequent and rapid shifting of the films backward and forward between utterly incon- gruous episodes. A LONG WAY FROM THE RIALTO HERE is much that is new and very interesting in ‘eptune’s Daughter”. Bermuda as a background is a great asset in itself. This is enhanced by combination with the swimming and diving abilities of Miss Kellerman and her associated mermaids, The atmosphere of reality in all this is most attractive, and the scenes in which the little girl mer- maid figures are delightful. The fight under water with real turtles and fish as adjuncts may be part fake, but it is a most remarkable accomplishment in photography and athletics combined. In spite of its defects “Neptune's Daughter” will doubt- less be a success from the commercial and showman point of view. It is worth while sitting through the claptrap scenes for the sake of seeing the really unusual ones. But if its producers are wise they will cut out a good many yards of the films that are only a strain on the eyes of the spectator. And it is a great pity to have wasted so much material with such valuable dramatic possibilities, VERY large part of the English- speaking world has laughed over and been moved by delightful “ Peter Pan". It is almost ten years since it was first produced in America, then, as now, with Maude Adams's exquisite impersonation of the title character. After all these years she seems to play the part with the same personal enjoyment as at first, and to have added delicate little touches that make it in its entirety a very remarkable es