The Moving picture world (November 1926-December 1926)

November 27, 1926 MOVING PICTURE WORLD 229 Cropping Full Length Figures Saves Half a Page Misdirected Qlance Carries Eye Outside We don't know whether H. G. Olspn placed this cut in the display for the Jeffris Theatre, Janesville, Wis., or whether it is plan book, but the face is turned the wrong way. It is not good practice to have a portrait looking away from the type, and when a cut is placed like this it is apt to carry the glance over to the next advertisement instead of directing the attention to the advertisement it is supposed to be working for. CONSTANCE , JALMADCg ■ THE BOY FKIEND \ "PAY NIGHT" LOOKING AWAY This looks as though it were part of a plan book cut, but if we had a cut like this, we would use the caw to get Norma to look at her own announcement. Apart from this, the layout is good, and there is a nice balance between the top lines and the eight point talk below. This space is not up to the Olson standard. He does better when he places less dependence on the supplied cuts. Ruffner Plays Fight With a Nice Display Ralph Ruffner, of the Capitol Theatre, Vancouver, B. C, writes that he is sending in his little better than a half page on the Dempsey-Tunney fight just to make managers in the States envious, for Ruff can play the picture without interference, though the actual fight may not be seen here outside the State in which the battlei was fought. Ruff writes that at the regular admission of 55 cents, he played the attractioa to .v.cre — .cr.:y than he ever took in at any price. But it took some nice figuring to get this just right. This looks like a simple and natural layout, but Ruff had a lot of figuring to do. He knew that the big smash was the fight. This had to be played to the limit, and yet he had two other good sales features, and he did not want to lose either. He solved this problem by pulling in his checkered border to make two ears, which held his musical attraction and Norma Shearer well apart from the fighters, and yet held all three together with the top line. Norma Shearer is a good seller for the Capitol, and he was not going to let even a heavyweight champion knock her out. His musical offering also has sales value to a class of persons who are not interested in the fighting, and they, too, had to be sold apart from the scrap. And to top it all, the cuts supplied gave him 15-inch figures of Dempsey and Tunney, which seemed to call for a full page space. And yet a full page would have sold no more seats than a half, so the cuts were sawed, to give half length figures that were just as good from a sales angle. The net result was that Ruff's big business was materially contriljuted to by patrons who came from below the Canadian border, even from Seattle. The sales copy is characteristic; not as jazzy as Ruff would have written for the States, but still interesting and readable. It's not often that we get a sample from Ruff these days, but he is still clicking seven days a week. of a submarine, but Colleen Moore in It Must Be Love comes through very nicely, and apparently she was elected to do the selling. This seems to have been set in larger measure and then reduced in cut form, for the line just below the stars in The Great Deception is only about three points high, and they do not make type that small. Ap iSiaximum of Type in This Boston Display While most Boston managers seem to regard all hand lettering as more or less essential, the Fenway does nicely with a maximum of type, as shown in this 50x2, rather a small space in which to display two attractions, yet reasonably large for Boston. The second title. The Great Deception carries a cut of the submarine that clouds the title without yielding a compensating value in scene action. At first glance it looks more like a broom than the coming tower GOOD FOR BOSTON parently the design was made four column width and then reduced, and this is both better and cheaper than using hand lettering, if you use not smaller than eight point. The printer can supply the type lines to be pasted on the sheet and a neater job will result than where the lettering is all pen work. Crowded Drawings Lack Real Punch Probably in Nova Scotia the theatres are glad to get what help they can, but we do not particularly like this set of triangular sketches on Sporting Life used by the Casino theatre, Halifax. The management has CAPITOL ^HEA-lIP GIANT TRIPLE -FEATURE BILL HERE MONDAY CALVIN WINTER "CAPlfoLIANS' "CKASHINC HOME' UNPRECEDENTED OFFERING ! OFFICIAL ■ EXCLUSIVE \ ■■ MOTION PICTURES ■ ■ NORMA SHEARER I "The Waning Sex" coNR;£*N*ci'i. HOW THE LATE RALPH RUFFNER HANDLED THE BIG FIGHT