Canadian Film Weekly (May 11, 1949)

Page scan 0004 from Canadian Film Weekly

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Film Weekly
Date:
May 11, 1949
Volume:
Canadian Film Weekly (May 11, 1949)
Leaf #:
0004
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 21, 2025
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May 11, 1949 AA-MONO SKED (Continued from Page 1) Artists, with eight to be filmed at the studios in Hollywood and two in England, under a contract recently signed with Associated British Pictures Corporation. Monogram will contribute 28 features, with an additional 18 westerns. Details of the program will be definitely set during the next few days at a series of meetings between Broidy and the Sales staff, following approval voted at the board of director's meetings in Chicago. Scott R. Dunlap, King Brothers and Roy Del Ruth are expected to contribute films under the Allied Artists trade mark, and under the Monogram banner the various series which have been successful in the past will be continued. There will be four pictures in the Bowery Boys series; and two each in the Joe Palooka, Charlie Chan, Henry the Rainmaker, and Jiggs and Maggie groups. Roddy McDowall will star in two productions, and there will be additional Bomba, the Jungle Boy, films. Three western series, to consist of six each, will star Johnny Mack Brown with Max Terhune; Jimmy Wakely with Cannonball Taylor; and Whip Wilson with Andy Clyde. In discussing the c.mpanies’ financial condition, Broidy pinted out that, while profits have decreased owing the enhanced production costs, the release of completed high-budget Allied Artists pictures, which will be effected by November, will bring an increase of at least $1,000,0U0 in rentals next year, 3S compared with the present fiscal period. The Babe Ruth Story, he noted, has already grossed nearly $2,000,000, and will eventually return a substantial profit. The following producers are currently on the Monogram roster: Jeffrey Bernerd, Lindsley Parsons, Jan Grippo, James S. Burkett, Hal E. Chester, Walter Mirisch, Barney Gerrard, Peter Scully, Barney Sarecky and Louis Gray. John Agar Borrowed John Agar has again been borrowed from Vanguard Films by RKO for a role in I Married a Communist. 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The National Film Board carried off five of the ten awards in the first of what will be an annual competition, its non-theotrical winners being praised for their “courage and honesty of treatment.” In the opening remarks to the audience Dr. Keenleyside praised the work ‘of the Canadian Association for Adult Education, which sponsored the awards, for encouraging greater creative effort in Canadian film-making. Photos are by the National Film Board. Marta Toren Named To ‘Panther's Moon’ Universal International has exercised the option on Marta Toren’s contract and at the same time has assigned her the role of leading lady in Panther’s Moon. The picture is a post-war spy story played against the locale of Italy and Switzerland, which Robert Arthur will produce and Frederick De Cordova direct. Stars For WB Film Gordon MacRae and Doris Day will have the singing romantic leads in Warners’ When Old New York Was Young. Paul Christian Set For Ul's 'Bagdad' Paul Christian, Swiss actor imported by Universal-International several months ago, has been set to star with Yvonne De Carlo in the Technicolor production Bagdad. Christian, who starred on both stage and screen in Vienna before coming to this country, was scheduled to play one of the top roles in Sword in the Desert, but had to be withdrawn from the cast at the last minute because of a serious eye infection. Bagdad wil be his first picture made in the United States, Page 5 TRADE SERIES (Continued from Page 1) signments are: History Brought to Life, to be made at Paramount; Moments in Music, Metro Goldwyn Mayer; The Costume Designer, RKO Radio; Screen Directors, Warner Brothers; Screen Writers, 20th Century-Fox. Scripts on all five subjects have been approved by the industry committee in charge, of which Y. Frank Freeman is chairman. Work will start immediately on assembling film, much of it from memorable features of the past, Leenhouts stated. 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Top Roles Filled In Columbia Serial Top roles in Columbia’s Adventures of Sir Gallahad, serial to be produced by Sam Katzman, were filled recently with the Signing of George Reeves for the title role; Nelson Leigh for the part of King Arthur; Hugh Prosser as Sir Lancelot; and William Fawcett as Merlin, the magician. The chapter-play, based on the stories of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round-Table, will be directed by Spencer Bennett and Derwin Abrahams. Hit Theatre Owners Delhi Man Fined Fines totalling $20 and costs were levied against a Delhi, Ontario, man on three charges of common assault for striking Mr. and Mrs. R. D'Hondt and their son, owners of the Imperial Theatre in Delhi. The accused admitted to having had some beer previous to attempting to get into the theatre without an admission ticket. When the owners tried to stop him he struck several blows. The magistrate warned him that if he ever came back on a similar charge a jail sentence would be added, dite in iia ta ie ee