Canadian Film Weekly (Jan 27, 1943)

Page scan 0005 from Canadian Film Weekly

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Film Weekly
Date:
Jan 27, 1943
Volume:
Canadian Film Weekly (Jan 27, 1943)
Leaf #:
0005
Language:
English
Subjects:
Motion Pictures, Film Industry Trade Magazine",Canad
Collection:
Global Cinema, Canada, and Hollywood Studio System
Format:
periodicals
Contributor:
Media History Digital Library, Canadian Picture Pioneers, Paul Moore and Jessica Whitehead
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:

Canadian Film Weekly

  • Editor: Hye Bossin (1942-64)
  • Renamed Canadian Film & TV Bi-Weekly (1965-69, editor: Stan Helleur)
  • Renamed Candian Film Weekly(1970, editor: Ed Hocura)

Canadian Film Weekly (1942-70) was edited by Hye Bossin and published by Film Publications of Canada, Ltd., wholly owned by leading exhibitor, Nat Taylor. In the late 1930s, Taylor was head of the Independent Theatre Association and his Toronto-based chain, Twinex-Century (Twentieth Century), was the largest independent circuit in the country. In 1941, however, he negotiated for chain affiliation with upstart Canadian Odeon before leveraging a better deal and greater booking control with nationally-dominant Famous Players Canada, Ltd. No longer independent, he took ownership of the Independent Theatre Association’s semi-monthly magazine, The Canadian Motion Picture Exhibitor (1940-41), installed Hye Bossin as editor, and laid plans to relaunch in January 1942 under a new name, Canadian Film Weekly. This enduring key publication was no longer solely focused on independent exhibitors but instead covered the entire industry on a national scale–exhibition, distribution and production–with some attention given to studio news from New York and Hollywood.

Bossin was a vibrant writer with a canny way with words, admired in the industry in the United States as well as Canada. He was one of a large family who lived above their father’s secondhand shop in the Jewish “ward” downtown in Toronto. His older brother was a bookie with ties to the underground; his younger brother was a famous journalist, protégé of Walter Winchell, and Hollywood screenwriter. In contrast, Hye spent nearly two decades learning the publishing trade in a printers’ shop before trying a stint as a Hollywood publicist, then writing a column for the Toronto Star Weekly before taking Taylor’s offer to edit the Film Weekly. Bossin was central to the creation of the Canadian Film Archive, the Canadian Film Awards, and he wrote some of the first histories of early cinema in Canada, published in the first volumes of the annual Canadian Film Weekly Year Book (1951-70).

In 1957, the Film Weekly had incorporated the rival Canadian Moving Picture Digest (1917-57), and began dating its start to that paper’s earlier start as the Canadian Universal Bulletin (1915-18). Subsequent variants of the Canadian Film Weekly and its yearbooks always claimed their roots all the way back to 1915 and the origins of the film industry trade press in Canada. After Bossin died in 1964, the Weekly’s new editor, Stan Helleur, renamed the magazine Canadian Film & TV Bi-Weekly, scaling back the pace of publishing but adding a purview for television and broadcasting. The annual was renamed similarly, its subtitle amended to “Year Book of the Canadian Entertainment Industry.” An attempted renewal to weekly format in 1970, edited by Ed Hocura, was short-lived and Nat Taylor decided instead to relaunch under an entirely new title, Canadian Film Digest (1971-77) and Canadian Film Digest Yearbook (1971-86).

– Paul Moore, March 2024

Further Reading

  • Bossin, Hye. “Canada and the Film: The Story of the Canadian Motion Picture Industry.” In Canadian Film Weekly Year Book of the Canadian Motion Picture Industry, 21-41. Toronto: Film Publications of Canada, 1951.
  • Moore, Paul. “Chronicling a National History: Hye Bossin’s Canadian Film Weekly and Year Book.” In Eric Hoyt and Kelley Conway, eds., Global Movie Magazines. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2024.

Date Added:
August 01, 2024
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. Roeesing 8. Gives You Action for Screen Ads Boxoffice $$$ $3 $ $ Money Makers $$$ $F $ PAPER BULLETS Alan Ladd, Joan Woodbury SCHOOL FOR HUSBANDS Rex Harrison, Diana Churchill DANGEROUS CARGO A saga of the English and Russian Navies on the high seas SECRETS OF A CO-ED Tina Thayer, Otto Kruger, Rick Vallin BABY FACE MORGAN Mary Carlisle, Robert Armstrong, Richard Cromwell NIGHT FOR CRIME Glenda Farrell, Lyle Talbot Producers Releasing Corporation LIMITED Executive Offices: 277 Victoria St., Toronto, 2, Ont. Canadian FILM WEEKLY = Non-Pro Programs {Commandos Gets e e e Big in Britain (Continued from Page 1) people were shown films by meahs] grades, Army Units and Royal Air of the “Celluloid Circus,” Ministry of Information’s 1380 mobile film units, most of them equipped for 16 mm. films, a few for 35 mm. These vans drive round the country, set up and give their programmes in Villages and small towns, to Women’s Institutes and social clubs, in barns or churches, to factory workers in their canteens during lunchtime or midnight breaks, to seamen and dockers’ clubs along the waterfronts, anywhere from the outer Hebrides to the Scilly Isles. The programmes usually last from 80 to 90 minutes, and are made up of films of general interest ana instruction, training films for civil defense workers and fire guards, films to show factory workers how vital a part they play in the problems of war, films for farmers, for amateur gardeners changing over from rose growing to cabbages, films on blood transfusion, accident prevention and the need to keep healthy in the stress of war, films about the men and women in all the fighting services on every war front, the British and the other United Nations too. Another million of the audience has been reached by special showings arranged in movie theatres out of ordinary hours. These cinemas have often been lent free of charge. The programmes frequently showed training films to Civil Defense audiences, or were tied up with special campaigns launched by the Ministries of Labour or Health, Agriculture or Food. The third method of reaching this audience has been through the free lending of films by the London Central Film Library, the Scottish and South West of England Film Libraries. With a supply of 750 different films, these libraries took care of 48,000 bookings during the year—an increase of more than 200 per cent over the previous year—lending to 1800 organizations and individuals with cheir own projectors. The average audience at these showings was approximately 100 people. The Central Film Library also includes the pre-war Empire and General Post Office film libraries of about 400 films, many of these the mow famous first documentary films to be made, in addition to the Ministry's own post-war production of 350 current films. The borrowers of these pictures included people of widely differing interests: there were 500 adult organizations of various kinds, 480 local authorities, 387 youth organizations, 650 schools of all the | Force Stations, factories, churches, hospitals and prisons. So mo matter what anyone’s job may be in Great Britain now, how few the leisure hours or how inaccessible the camps, billets or hostels, anyone who wants to attend these films can always find out just what is happening on the other war fronts, and how each job fits into the complicated pattern of total war. A Lovely Jinx! Beautiful and Douglas Drake in Columbia’s new comedy, ““Laugh Your Blues Away.” Jinx Falkenburg Used Apparatus Wanted We have calls from time to time for Used Simplex Mechanisms, Magazines, Stands, Mazda Lamp Units, Motor Generator Sets, De Forest Sound Heads, Griswold Splices, Motors, Rheostats, Rewinders, Speakers, Amplifiers, etc. Let us know what you have to spare so that we will know what is available as required. COLEMAN ELECTRIC CO. 258 VICTORIA ST., TORONTO January 27th, 1 3 Much Publicity Such outstanding Canadian papers as the Toronto Globe and a Mail and the Toronto Evening Telegram, among others, gave plenty of space in their columns to the debut of Columbia’s “The © Commandos Strike at Dawn,” which stars Paul Muni, Lillian Gish, Anna Lee, Sir Cedric Hardwicke and Robert Coote. The film ~~ ~ shows Canadian Commandos among those raiding Norway and a showing for Norwegian airmen and Canadian officers drew cheers, Most of the action was shot in British Columbia, where the scenery and coastline are very much like those of Norway. The troops include men from the Rocky Mountain Rangers, who take the part of the Nazi defenders; the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Riff of Quebec, the Canadian Scottish, and other units on the Pacific Coast, as well as several staff officers, who play roles much similar to their own duties at headquarters. While the stars and most of the featured players are Americans, one of them, Robert Coote, is an Englishman, who is an officer in the RCAF. Quite a number of minor parts are played by Canadians, including that of the ship’s captain, and the ship is the one he normally commands. Canadian army officers who have seen the film claim it is an excellent one of Commando training as taught to men in Canada’s army, and state that it would be an excellent instructional film.