Canadian Moving Picture Digest (Apr 1923-Apr 1924)

Page scan 000796 from Canadian Moving Picture Digest

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Moving Picture Digest
Date:
Apr 1923-Apr 1924
Volume:
Canadian Moving Picture Digest (April 1923-April 1924)
Leaf #:
000796
Language:
English
Subjects:
Motion Pictures, Film Industry Trade Magazine",Canad
Collection:
Hollywood Studio System, Global Cinema, Early Cinema, and Canada
Format:
periodicals
Contributor:
New York Public Library
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:

Canadian Moving Picture Digest

Editors: Merrick R. Nutting (1917-18), Raymond S. Peck (1918), Ray Lewis (1918-19 and 1920-54), Walter Greene (1919-20), Jay Smith (1954-57)

Canadian Moving Picture Digest (1917-57) was initially a Montréal-based rival of the first film paper in Canada, Toronto-based Canadian Universal Bulletin (1915-18, edited by W.A. Bach 1915-17, J.W. Cambridge 1917-18, Raymond S. Peck 1918). The two periodicals were combined in 1918, keeping the Digest name, but moving production to Toronto with Peck as editor. Canadian Moving Picture Digest assumed The Bulletin’s volume numbering and always claimed 1915 as its year of origin. Ray Lewis (née Rae Levinsky) was a writer and playwright, who spent time in early Hollywood’s publicity departments. She briefly took the Digest helm in 1918, then long-term editor, later owner and publisher, from 1920 until her death in 1954. Under Lewis’s leadership, the trade paper claimed to serve as a voice for independent exhibitors and advocated for a Canadian cultural presence in cinema, particularly emphasizing British films as a way to keep a distance from Hollywood. Lewis's editorials were notable for their advocacy, wit, and critique of American dominance in the Canadian film market. While initially positioning herself as an outsider, she became integrated within the industry and a true insider. She even had an ongoing correspondence with Canadian Prime Minister R. B. Bennett, advocating for the industry as a whole and supporting British film imports. She was well-known at Toronto’s Dundas Square film row as well as in New York and Hollywood. Variety’s Sime Silverman called her “the Girl Friend in Canada,” and she delighted when U.S. writers not “in the know” presumed “Ray” was a man’s name. Lewis was later an inaugural member of the Canadian Picture Pioneers, eventually the group’s first female president and Pioneer of the Year. After she died in 1954, her son Jay Smith took over editorial duties until Canadian Moving Picture Digest was bought by Nat Taylor’s Film Publications of Canada in 1957. Taylor incorporated the legacy journal into a joint masthead for Canadian Film Weekly (1942-70), which subsequently dated its roots back to the 1915 origins of the film press in Canada.

– Jessica Whitehead and Paul Moore, March 2024

Further Reading

  • Whitehead, Jessica, Louis Pelletier and Paul Moore, “‘The Girl Friend in Canada’: Ray Lewis and Canadian Moving Picture Digest (1915–1957).” In Daniel Biltereyst and Lies Van de Vijver, eds., Mapping Movie Magazines: Digitization, Periodicals and Cinema History, 127-52. London: Pagrave-Macmillan, 2021.

Date Added:
July 31, 2025
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ene BD | WF TORONTO, ONTARIO. Page Eleven Digest Reviews Current Attractions “Name the Man” GOLDWYN-COSMOPOLITAN Through Regal Films. ICTOR SEASTROM is among us, for which the gods be praised! Some men make a business of directing, others have actually caused it to be referred to as a profession, Seastrom has made it an art, with no room for controversy. If you want your house to acquire a new high water mark in entertainment standards get busy and book “Name the Man.” If you want your patrons to enjoy beauty, thrills, action and great drama “Name the Man” will be your choice—it is one of the best of the great ones, and can stand the limit In superlatives. Every exhibitor who has played “Name the Man” has burned up the wires with praise for the producers and this Seastrom who has come from Europe to show America how to produce the classics in fiction. Victor Seastrom has caught the atmosphere of Sir Hall Caine’s powerful story, “Master of Man,” and imprisoned it in one of the screen’s most eloquent pictures, he has fearlessly and masterfully presented a Story which, to say the least, needs delicate handling in the screen translation, and he has fashioned a drama Which captures and holds the intellect to the last fade out. “Name the Man” is not a very happy story. It tells of a daughter of the common people who is turned out late at night in a terrible storm by a hard, God-fearing stepfather. The son of the revered Deemster of the Isle of Man gives her shelter. Later through the Deemster’s death his son succeeds to the Judgeship and is obliged to sentence the girl to death for having killed her baby. He is the child’s father. [he escape of the girl from prison, the young Deemster’s self-denunciation to the people, his reclamation through _the devotion of a sweet /oung girl, the constancy of a great Ove in face of adversity; the whole compelling story so remarkable in its fovception of life is made to live beore your eyes in a way that beggars description. "The work of the stars, Me careful and effective use of closeHPs, the perfection of the long shots oth interior and exterior, the wonderful handling of scenes in we ny Before 30 uying By H. M. BALL the dramatic incidents of the story. require the utmost ability of the principles, the marvelous scenic beauty depicted in fine photography — these are a few of the details which have made this picture-so unusual. Conrad Nagel as Victor Stowell, the Deemster’s son; Mae Busch as Bessie Collister, the ruined girl; Creighton Hale as Alick, who loves her; Patsy Ruth Miller, as Fennella, sweetly devoted to Victor, and Hobart Bosworth, as Dan Collister, the man who loves God but hates his daughter, are perfectly cast. Evelyn Selbie as the mother of the unmarried mother does one of the most remarkable pieces of character work we have ever seen in pictures. Conviction marks the production in its entirety. Welcome, Victor Seastrom, to the field of American production! * Ok Kk “White Tiger” UNIVERSAL. In presenting Priscilla Dean in “White Tiger,” Carl Laemmle proves conclusively that Universal is not restricted to one class of production when it is a matter of blue ribbons. Historical romance, modern colorful drama, spectacle, bright comedy and most universally accepted of all — melodrama, he has them all. ‘ “White Tiger” is melodrama. Audience appeal is strong in this story of a crook’s revenge. Moreover it is a delightful little sidelight on the interesting theory “when can a crook trust a crook?” Priscilla Dean, who has never inspired us to any raptures, is Sylvia Donovan, an intriguing crook-daughter of a crook. She is brought up by Hawkes, alias Count Donelli, a stool pigeon who has been responsible for her father’s death. She believes that her brother, Roy (Ray Griffith), was killed in the same raid, and he is alive thinking the same fate has befallen his sister. They meet when Donelli takes his mechanical chess player, which has baffled Europe, to America where it naturally proves even more baffling. The trio work as follows: They ensconse themselves in a Fifth Avenue mansion. Sylvia, effectively clad, vamps the patrons, Donelli, suave and well groomed, poses as the perfect host and “the Kid,” as her brother Cd Ses Read The Digest Advertising ‘Pages. is known, crawls into the box and by clever mianipulation jips American multi-millionaires and would-be chess experts out of their pretty pennies. A bright young sleuth, Dick Longworth, played. by Matt Moore, who must have journied over from England, for there are surely no such bright young detectives on this continent, gets wise to Count Donelli, falls in love with his foster daughter and invites the merry triumverate to his hunting cabin for a little party. His ‘suspicions are confirmed and when Donelli is trapped he is not at all surprised to find them in hiding at his lodge in the woods. Here the four have a gay pitched battle of wits for several’ days, ending in the disappearance of Donelli, the “Kid’s” discovery that Sylvia ts his sister and her acceptance of the sleuth’s proposal. “White Tiger’? is a character study more than it is a thriller, but it has the advantage of humor at times, and -may be rated as an interesting de velopment along slightly different lines. It is no cyclone nor is it a slouch. Tod Browning has given us the boudoir angle of crook life, a few parlor glimpses and a scene or two in the kitchen, where ant poison is used as a savory—-sometimes. Wallace Beery as Count Donelli does the one outstanding bit of work—he is thrillingly awful as the master crook. Manager Resigns. Staff Dismissed Theatre Carries On Miller Stewart, manager for the past three years of the Metropolitan Theatre, Winnipeg, (formerly the Allen) has resigned the position and is succeeded by J. A. Reich, recently of Minneapolis, but who formerly managed his own theatre at Estevan, Sask., and who later connected himself with (Kem, Leach’s theatres in Calgary. The last theatre he had in western Canada was at Edmonton.’ The entire staff of the “Met.” was dismissed following the manager’s resignation. Mr. Stewart will probably join the staff of the Gordon Amusement Co. in Boston, owners of 22 houses, of which Charles G, Branham is general: manager: