Year book of motion pictures (1951)

ENGLAND -A SURVEY A HIGH NEW QUOTA, a new Anglo-U. S. Agreement and slight concessions in Entertainments Tax were the highlights of 1950. All in all, it was not a particularly encouraging year. From most parts of the country came reports of smaller attendances, although a big factor on the other side was the Odeon report wherein J. Arthur Rank was able to announce a profit of £552,264 against a loss of £1,341,494. Moreover, there was a reduction of £3,336^45 in bank loan and overdrafts. The reduction of quota from 40 per cent to 30 per cent came after reports of the Plant Committee and recommendations from the Films Council. The Committee also reported that in their view the amounts levied in entertainments tax were excessive, .^fter protracted negotiations between Government departments and most of the trade organizations, a scheme was arrived at— usually called the Eady plan —to associate small reductions in the duty with a voluntary levy to be devoted towards British production. Put briefly, the changes mean that seats up to 7d. are exempt from duty and there is a halfpenny reduction on all seats up to l/6d. .^bove this price there is an additional penny per seat of which the Chancellor of the Exchequer takes a halfpenny and the other halfpenny is divided between the exhibitor and the Eady pool from which allocations will be made to British producers. Eric A. Johnston and Ellis Arnall came to London to meet Harold Wilson and top officers of the Board of Trade on the revised .\nglo-U. S. agreement which actually began to operate on October 1. Under this arrangement, earnings will be convertible to the extent of 17 million dollars, as in the 1948 Agreement. The provision of the 1948 Agreement relating to the earnings of British films in the United States is dropped. Instead, the American companies will be allowed to remit dollars in addition to 17 million dollars on the basis of the formula set out in paragraph (1) of the attached statement, which will be included as an Appendix in the new Film Agreement. (1) In respect of payments from unremittable sterling made between October I, 1950 ;ind September 29, 1951, dollars equal to (a) 23 per cent of such payments, relating directly or indirectly to film production, when such payments are made in the United Kingdom, or if made elsewhere are made with respect to British quota films or to films of which the majority of the studio scenes are photographed in United Kingdom studios, and (b) 50 per cent of such payments to British interests for the distribution of British films within the Western Hemisphere on a percentage basis, and (c) 50 per cent of such payments to British interests for the acquisition of rights within the Western Hemisphere, other than on a percentage basis, for British films. (2) Net payments made to British interests in dollars in respect of I (b) and 1 (c) shall also be treated for this purpose as if they were payments from unremittable sterling. COMPETITION ■ N THE MOTION PICTURE film market of the United Kingdom competition is piactically limited to that between Britishinatle and .American films. Other foreign |jictures account for an entirely insignificant proportion of the total shown and are praclically confined to a few theaters in the largest centers which specialize in this type of entertainment. French, Italian and Scandinavian pictures form the major part of this prochiit. In Seplember the Board of Trade lifted the War time order controlling raw stock. First result of this was to remove control from the use of cinematograph film for the manufacture of newsreel prints and a corollary was the termination of the supplementary contract which prevented exhibitors terminating or changing their newsreel contracts. Safetybase film came into general use in parts of Wales, and the re t of the United Kingdom will follow, probably regionally. A fact-finding committee representing the entire industry has been set up to examine the impact on the industry of the safety stock. CENSORSHIP IN ORG.\NI/,ATION established by films in Great Britain. It is not a statutory the trade years ago, the British Board of body, and whether a film is accepted or re Film Censors, deals with the censorship of jected, the final decision rests with the locai 736