Yet this would seriously interfere with the character of the photoplay.

We need there this overcoming of the depth, we want to have it as a picture only and yet as a picture which strongly suggests to us the actual depth of the real world.

We want to keep the interest in the plastic world and want to be aware of the depth in which the persons move, but our direct object of perception must be without the depth.

That idea of space which forces on us most strongly the idea of heaviness, solidity and substantiality must be replaced by the light flitting immateriality.
But the photoplay sacrifices not only the space values of the real theater; it disregards no less its order of time.

The theater presents its plot in the time order of reality.