THE ENEMIES OF FRENCH FILM
Do not cry out at the paradox: there is no worse enemy of French film than the French.

     Many times, I have, in various pages, pointed out the absurd conduct of some of us who, out of snobbery, bias, even out of ignorance, do everything they can to assassinate this French film, which, I I swear, it has a very solid frame to be able to withstand the blows that we inevitably throw at it at any time.
     Some, and you know them as much as I do, are full of admiration, indulgence, even weakness for everything that comes from Germany, America or elsewhere as long as it is not from France.
     Some proclaim, publish, spread the absurd legend of the decadence of an art born in our country. For them, there are only perfect artists whose names are impossible for our lips to say, there are only true directors who work in foreign studios, and, to listen to them, France would be completely trailing other nations.
     I admit that it is not without a pang of heart that I see the immense and insolent publicity made on foreign artists, publicity most often free, while these artists receive wonderful fees which they ring in all respects.
Remember the clever note about Baby Peggy! In a few days, all the newspapers of France and Navarre were discussing and polemicizing the young artist's fabulous salaries. This is, in fact, everything the publishers wanted... now we know Baby Peggy!
Our artists are modest, much too modest, they disdain these tom-tom processes, they do not invade the letters of magazines and newspapers with their photos, their biographies and Jours petite faits; they wait patiently for someone to want to talk about them for a serious and interesting reason.
     Now, all of you who dream of giving French film the place to which it is entitled, remember this: any flashy publicity given to a foreign artist never harms this artist, but always harms French artists.
Don't you think that a little discretion wouldn't be amiss from time to time? But that is not just the evil, there is worse, there is even more terrible, and it would take a volume to tell it all, to bring it all to light.
     No agreement has yet been reached between directors, between theater directors, between producers, regarding the presence of French film in programs while abroad all the branches of this wonderful industry support and work together. help in any way you can.
To sell our films abroad we have no serious organization and too often a producer or director leaves discreetly with his film under his arm to try to sell it.
     He will go far without even having carried out a small advertising campaign, without having prepared his trip to be sure that what he shows will be to the public's taste.
     So much time wasted, so much money wasted! To sell a film to some buyer passing through Paris is even more lamentable and I know how certain films are sold... haphazardly... by the weight of the film, so to speak!
Very good films are thus given at any price and buyers know how to take advantage of our weakness to offer us, with each of their visits, increasingly ridiculous prices. Wouldn't they be stupid not to take advantage of it? I witnessed this tactic and I am now fixated on the causes of the poor sales of our films abroad.
     It is not a question of exaggerating the prices, but, please, that we do not give the result of so much effort and work for a few tickets which, in the eyes of certain foreigners, are only a miserable alms. It’s because we cried out about the crisis of French film, it’s because we wrote that French cinematography was sick, it is because we did not know how to enter the markets that we are currently suffering very seriously. We do not have confidence in ourselves, we do not have confidence in our artists and, very often, it is the foreigner who reveals to us the perfection of a particular production.
     Do you know that certain French films are received and applauded with enthusiasm abroad? Do you know that these films, purchased for a few thousand francs, produce good revenues? Since foreigners come to us to ask for French films and buy them anyway, despite the faults they want to find in them, it seems to me that our films are not that bad! Les Hommes nouveau, the beautiful film edited by Aubert, has just been presented in London. I have seen the publicity surrounding this film, I have read the newspaper reports, I assure you that the praise (in no way paid) is worth reading. I'm not talking to you about Atlantis, La Dame de Monsoreau, these films are sold in every country in the world, but there are hundreds of films in the same situation.
     As long as the French do not have confidence in their work, as long as they have not lost the habit of denigrating each other, as long as they have not adopted commercial methods in line with the goals they continue, we will remain in the rut, and, even more, we ourselves will kill our beautiful industry.

C.-F. Tavano