Moving Picture World (Jul-Sep 1914)

Record Details:

Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

THE MOVING PICTURE WORLD 1071 EXHIDITOtlS J. P. Chalmers, Founder. Published Weekly by the Chalmers publishing Company 17 MADISON AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY. (Telephone, 3510 Madison Square.) I. P. Chalmers, Sr President J. F. Chalmers Vice-President i. J. Chalmers Secretary and Treasurer John Wylie General Manager The office of the company is the address of the officers. vVestern Ofkke— Suite 917-919 Schiller Building. 64 West Randolph St., Chicago, HI. Telephone, Central 5099. SUBSCRIPTION RATES. United States. Mexico, Hawaii, Porto Rico and Philippine Islands $3.00 per year Canada 3. SO per year Foreign Countries (Postpaid) 4.00 per year ADVERTISING RATES. C1.ASSIFIED Advertising — no display — three cents per word ; minimum charge, SOc. DisPL.AY Ad\-ertising Rates made known on application. NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS. All changes of address should give both old and new addresses in full and clearly written. NOTE. — Address all correspondence, remittances and subscriptions to Moving Picture World, P. O. Box 226, Madison Square Station, New York, and not to individuals. (The Index for this issue v.'ill be found on page 1162.) Entered at the General Post Office. New York City, as Second Class Matter. Saturday, August 22, 1914. Facts and Comments A COURT of inferior jurisdiction in Philadelphia has denied an injunction against the enforcement of the Pennsylvania censorship law. The court says that the law is a proper exercise of the police power and ought to stand. We do not know whether there will be an appeal, but we earnestly hope there will be. There is a tendency in certain quarters to curry favor with censors in the expectation of special favors "or lenience. Such an attitude not only shows a poor spirit, unworthy of a real .\merican, but it is poor business policy. The censor of today may be wheedled into friendJiness,. but what about the censor of tomorrow?. What abpiit tlie great principle involved in the issue of censorship? Why should the producer of motion pictures be called upon to mollify and conciliate a censor? ile is not engaged in a dubious calling, but in a strictly legitimate enterprise which is of great benetit to the whole conimunily. He is not a pariah or lei)er who must be cleansed before he can be permitted to mingle with other folk. We will never inspire fear or respect by truckling to the politicians. Weakening in the maintenance of a great |irinciple is an invitation to the grafters to load more inirdens on the industry. Let us not become disheartened because the courts show a tendency to uphold the censorship laws. Courts are not infallible. The highest court of the land, in the greatest issue it was called upon to decide, decided straight against the best public opinion, iiolding that the fugitive slave law was constitutional. Today this decision is part of the garbage of history. The people everywhere begin to assert the right to overrule the court whenever the great majority take a different view of the law in (luestimi. However, this may be the agitation against censorshi]), the ])arent of graft and the weaiion of tyrants, will never be checked by the decision of the Court of Common J^'leas in the city and county of Philadelphia. If we cannot set the law aside as unconstitutional we can work for its speedy repeal. The exhil)itors of the state are working for the repeal at the present moment and the camjiaign will grow much hotter l)efore election day is here. A concerted attack on the law with the slide as a most effective weapon is planned by the leaders of the Penn.'^ylvania exhibitors. It is projiosed to support only such candidates as wi'l pledge themselves to a repeal of the obnoxious measure. IN a large city in this state a little group of film men were discussing prices and prospects when one of them made the remarkable statement that the best reel ever made was not worth more than five dollars. Another man agreed with him and called upon the Almighty to punish him if he ever paid more than a rental of five dollars a reel. These gentlemen, we say it with all due respect, belong to the cave period of film history. Perhaps they have never seen anything better than timetable releases, but this must be doubted. The day is at hand when the men with such opinions will be jolted into the consciousness of higher things. A man will come along willing and even anxious to pay more than five dollars rental for a reel, and this will be the man who has his future before him. He will draw the patronage away from the men of little faith. We are approaching a condition of affairs when films will either be worth a good deal more than five dollars a reel or a good deal less. A film man of note with success as his credentials to be heard in council recently voiced his opinion to the writer that the next few years will bring great fortunes to the new type of exhibitor who knows how to hunt quality and how to present his pictures after he gets them. Many things will be torn up by the roots in the next few months. The man who will emerge from the confusion with a smile will be The Exhibitor With Brains. This man must be able to choose without asking others how to do it. He must know how to give individuality to his theater and to his program. Right now, and right here in New York, there are scores of theaters of good size that seem to have no head to them, apparently running themselves. The orchestra does what it pleases, the operator does what he pleases, attendants pass a sort of listless existence, and the whole place lacks the unifying, directing spirit. The modern trend; of the motion picture art will sweep these places out o it being before the fall is fully under way.