Moving Picture World (Jan-Feb 1927)

Record Details:

Title:
Moving Picture World
Date:
Jan-Feb 1927
Publisher:
New York, Chalmers Publishing Company
Volume:
Moving Picture World (Jan-Feb 1927)
Leaf #:
00025
Language:
English
Collection:
Early Cinema and Hollywood Studio System
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
The Museum of Modern Art Library, New York
Sponsor:
Media History Digital Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
Moving Picture World, founded in 1907 by J.P. Chalmers, was one of the motion picture industry's first trade papers. Published on a weekly basis in New York City, Moving Picture World informed exhibitors about films available for rental and editorialized on behalf of the growing industry (improving the quality of movies through higher filmmaking standards, not government censorship, was a frequent topic). The paper reached its height in the mid-to-late-1910s--a fact reflected in the circulation figures and the huge amount of advertising that filled every issue during the period. In the 1920s, Moving Picture World lost ground to other competing weekly trade papers -- including Variety, Exhibitor's Herald, and Motion Picture News. In 1927, Moving Picture World ceased publication when it was acquired by Martin Quigley's Exhibitor's Herald. Across the 20 year run of Moving Picture World, readers can watch the transition from short film programs to feature films and witness the transition from the dominance of Edison's Trust to the rise of the "Independent" film companies that ultimately became the Hollywood studios. Silent film historians have utilized and cited Moving Picture World more frequently than any other trade paper, and the publication still has many insights left to offer. -- Eric Hoyt, 2012/2013
Date Added:
September 21, 2023
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January 1, 1927 MOVING PICTURE WORLD 17 Make a Month a Year EXT month is National Laugh Month, but don’t be misled by that final word. It J'Ais not a month in which exhibitors wall make an especial effort to profit by the shorter lengths on their programs. It is the particular month wherein the combined efforts of the distributors are directed to helping the individual exhibitor to put over short subjects for the ensuing twelve months. It is an intensive drive wherein the best efforts of highly trained specialists in advertising and exploitation are directed to getting especial attention from the public with the idea of giving the movement a momentum whereby the exhibitor may, with a little care, profit for an entire year. To the public it is “National Laugh Month.” To the exhibitor it should be the start of a drive that is to last a full twelve months, and the exhibitor who does not make the fullest use of the movement is falling short of realizing the largest possible profits from his house. The work done on Laugh Month, if intelligently and conscientiously performed, will bring returns through the season, just as intensive work on the first chapter of a serial will sell the remaining instalments. It is designed to centre attention upon the shorts with the idea of bringing them so prominently to the fore that public taste will be whetted anew and the general theatregoer be brought to a realization that a motion picture program today is not merely the presentation of a feature, with a few short subjects to fill in the allotted time, but rather a well-planned offering of such diversified appeal that all tastes may be suited. To concentrate on the short subjects for a thirty-day period, only to drop back to “short features,” “others,” “and a comedy” or any of the other routine and bromidic appeals at the end of that time is to lose a battle after it has been ably won. Don’t figure that Laugh Month ends when you tear the January sheet from the calendar. Ligure that you have only just started to collect on your efforts, but remember that the supporting hands are withdrawn and that you must now stand on your own feet. Increase your sales efforts, since you are now working unaided, and sell throughout the year to the very best of your ability. Play up the shorts and you can make them bring you a larger profit on your investment than the high-priced special. It may be a month to the general public, but it should mean a year to you.