Year book of motion pictures (1951)

time have so many headaches assailed the trade. Producers are fated with virtual impossibility of recouping their costs in the home market, the exhibitors are finding the seat tax increasingly onerous because, like everybody else, their overheads mount steadily. Matters are rapidly approaching a climax where it '■eems obvious that unless a solution is found to urgent problems there may be considerable distress and a total breakdown in parts of the industry. The British fiscal system as it affects enteri tainment is complicated. Taxes are based on a graduated system increasing with each ri'"e of two or three pennies in the price of admission. Because of this se;it prices are forcibly pegged because the charge has in many ca.ses to be raised bv sixpence before it can yield twopence to the exhibitor. In an effort to assist producers, who are now receiving only a loken support from the Government sponsored Film Bank (which is shoit on fundsV a scheme has lieen devised I whereby admission charges have been increased by one penny. Of this .50 per cent goes to the Treasury in additional taxation and the remainder is equally split between the exhiI)itors and the producers. T^is scheme is known as the F.ady Plan from its originator. Sir Wilfrid F.ady. a high functionary in the Treasurv. I Today cxhiliitors and producers, with the distributors caught in the middle, are debating an extension of ihis plan hv doubling ; the surcharge on admission prices and giving ' each of the parties twice as much as they I are getting. So far the producers have reaped I a yield of approximately fi.^.OOO.OOO from the |l first year's operation, which is \ ery small beer 1,1 against the real needs of the studios if their production programs are to be assured. With two sides of the trade fighting finanil cial stringencies, a new blow is about to fall i| upon them with the complete turn-over , here to safety stock. It is computed that this will bring the business a bill of not less than $2,000,000 a year, so virtually nullifying the benefit it is receiving from the Eady Plan. The British Film Producers Association and KRS are suggesting that the CEA should participate in meeting this additional charge. The latter body, however, has shown strong resistance, claiming that its coinponent meinbers are in no case to meet additional charges without some alleviation of the tax burden. ' "Help us to get a bit off the tax and we mav be prepared to discuss safety stock with you" I is how Harry Mears, CEA president recently 1 expressed his Association's viewpoint. i Seat tax will always be a headache to show Diisiness. The advance of time makes of it an c\cr increasing bogey for the simple reason tiiat the industry's income cannot increase, although costs are always soaring upwards. Until and unless the Treasury can be persuaded either to reduce the level of taxes (an impossible hope in these days of rearmament and world uncertainty) or else readjust the tax scales to allow reasonable increases in prices of admis'^ion without attracting higher rates of duty, there can be no truly bright prospects for the future. Turning to the production side, the picture is confused in that, while there has been an output of good (]uality movies, the volume of production tends to diminish, with no immediate prospect of recovery. Extremist influences ainong tlie trade unions, with a measure of support from fellow travelers in Parliaineut, continue to shout for such impossibilities as nationalization of the industry, drastic tipping of the c|uota from 30 to 1.') per cent and an increase in the penalties on exhibitois who default on the compulsory playing time they have to devote to British films. This clamor has little or no efi^ect. but is symptomatic of the di'satisfaction which is rife on the production side. Producers have been gieatly heartened by the favoial)le attention devoted to British films l)oth in the United States and other parts of the world during 1950. There are indications that the successful films of that year have set a high standard likely to be maintained through \9!>\ and into next year. In the home market the ijesi domestic product still sets a formidable pace for Hollywood product. Locally there is great satisfaction with such sulijects as "The Browning Version" starring Michael Redgrave in an adaptation of Terence Rattigan's play; "Tales of Hoffman," the magnificently spectacular Technicolor offering from Powell and Pressburger who made "The Red Shoes," and "Happv Go Lovely," believed to be the first siicces fill British effort of a Technicolor musical and wiiich earned high critical praise at its leccnt pieview here. By and laige, however, the overriding concern in Britain is still how to get a greater return through the l)ox office so that all sides of the trade may look to a restoration of prosperous days. Alleviation of the seat tax would l)e one solution. But what is generally realized is that the trade has to pull itself up by its own bootstraps. It is confidently believed that by vigorous prosecution of its Better Business Campaign .some of those missing millions who today lack the movie habit may be encouraged into it.