Canadian Film Weekly (May 12, 1943)

Page scan 0001 from Canadian Film Weekly

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Film Weekly
Date:
May 12, 1943
Volume:
Canadian Film Weekly (May 12, 1943)
Leaf #:
0001
Language:
English
Subjects:
Motion Pictures, Film Industry Trade Magazine",Canad
Collection:
Canada, Hollywood Studio System, and Global Cinema
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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Page 2 Stan Wsetelly, Address all communications—The Managing Editor, Canadian Film Weekly, 21 Dundas Square, Toronto, Canada. Published by Film Publications of Canada, Ltd., Sth Floor, 21 Dundas Square, Toronto, Ont., Canada. Phone ADelaide 4310, Price 5 conts each or $2.00 per year. Entered as Second Class Matter All the Answers Nova Scotia theatre employees have received an interesting bulletin from the offices of their Victory Loan chairmen, Bob Roddick and Bill Cuzner. Not only does it provide the answers to any personal unceriainties that you may have about buying bonds but the material is valuable for general use. There is just about an answer to every question an indifferent citizen might present and theatre men everywhere in the Dominion are urged to use it. The bulletin reads: Vol. 8, No. 20 The 4th Victory Loan demands your attention. You can realize the necessity of participating or find an excuse for evading your duty. Here are some answers to common means of evasion. EVASION: We are winning now—look at Tunisia. ANSWER: Tunis is merely a Nazi outpost, but it has cost tens of thousands of lives and one whole year’s combined production from Canada, U.S.A. and England to get to Tunis. An attacking army must have double manpower and three times the number of guns, planes, tanks, and shells as the defending army. Hitler has 13,000,000 men and twice as much fire power to defend Europe. We have yet only 5,000,000 men ready to fight and are short on guns, planes, tanks. EVASION: I am doing all I can now. ANSWER: You eat, sleep, work a free person in a free country in perfect safety by the grace of your brother, husband, friend who has offered to give up his own life for your future. Whether he wins a victory or dies in defeat depends upon production, and production depends on your financial contribution. EVASION: My taxes are neavy, I already buy war stamps regularly, I must keep some money on hand for an emergency. ANSWER: About half of your taxes are savings returned to you at the war’s end. War Savings Certificates can be cashed to cover an emergency need for extra cash. Victory Bonds can be sold or borrowed upon to secure cash in an emergency. THESE are your wartime methods of saving. These are your only methods of insuring your future freedom and prosperity. EVASION: I hear the government is extravagant. ANSWER: If you really know of a specific instance of extravagance, tell it to your member of parliament. YOU are the government. If you are merely repeating rumour then stop spreading Nazi generated propaganda. Hitler and Goebbels also say “YOU can’t win so you may as well stop fighting.” EVASION: I haven’t enough money. ANSWER: You can buy as low as a $50.00 Bond. You can pay as little as $2.00 per week for 25 weeks. Your employer will finance your bond purchase for you, paying the carrying charges and delivering the bond with all coupons intact when they are fully paid for. Your taxes are paid up each week. You do not have to save for tax payments. EVASION: Pay me a higher salary and I'll buy a bond. ANSWER: This is YOUR war. If the government permitted increased wages, then you would have to pay more for food, clothes and fuel. That is inflation and inflation means less production at higher cost. The government, YOUR government, wants to avoid inflation now and at war’s end. They want you to have money at the war's end. You will have money then if you save now. Your dollars then will be worth 100 cents if you avoid inflation now. As a fellow employee, I appeal to each of you to realize the truth of the need of buying a bond on each loan. Look at it as a fighting civilian, as a citizen who desires a safe, free and prosperous future in Canada. Buy through your manager so that your motion picture industry reflects the patriotism of its personnel, Canadian FILM WEEKLY [New Policy for 7 May 12, 1943 HYE BOSSIN, Managing Editor Camp Theatres (Continued from Page 1) the distributors and army exhibitors. Protests about the age of the films shown to the soldiers have never ceased, although camps have been getting films at what the industry considers reasonably early dates. Now the newest films will be shown. It is unlikely exhibitors in military areas will object, business being what it is today. Famous Players and other circuits waived their protection a long time ago. Army camp theatres are unusually successful enterprises from @ profit standpoint. The gains have been used for camp recreation purposes, as well as for the betterment of the theatre proper. At Camp Borden, where the theatre has over 5,000 seats, several thousand were replaced recently. The distributors were perfectly willing to abstain from ordinary business practices until the camp shows were a complete success from every standpoint. That is the case now and the new terms are like those of USA military training centres, where they are ;satisfactory to all concerned. Army movie theatres charge 15 cents for the men and 25 cents for officers in most cases. Air force theatres have a similar price plan. Exhibs, Distribs In Buying Bee (Continued from Page 1) $100,000. Twentieth Century Theatres subscribed a total of $115,000. Bond subscription from circuits and exchanges reached something like $4,500,000 altogether during the last loan. These do not include employes subscriptions. The Victory Loan has gone past its former totals in most towns and theatre men have shared much of the credit. They are intensely active on local committees, as well as stimulating the intertheatre campaign. W. R. Watt, manager of the Capitol, Kitchener, Ontario, is way up front in the campaign in his area. Selling bonds, he jumped from 28th to first place. He has sold over $18,000 worth of bonds ir his spare time. Walter Helm of the Avon, Stratford, ran a Perth County Victory Loan quiz, the winners receiving war savings certificates. It won much unusual publicity for the Loan and stimulated sales. It’s the same everywhere. Theatre men are working hard in many ways and being repaid with fine results, May 12, 1948 Qeicasing 2, luted © Westerns Billy the Kid TRAPPED * Billy the Kid SHERIFF OF SAGE VALLEY * Billy the Kid OUTLAWED Ras Billy the Kid IN TEXAS * Billy the Kid GUN JUSTICE * Billy the Kid RANGE WAR STARRING Buster Crabbe Al St. John * Producers Releasing Corporation LIMITED Executive Offices: 277 Victoria St., Toronto, 2, Ont.