Canadian Film Weekly (Dec 28, 1955)

Page scan 00023 from Canadian Film Weekly

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Film Weekly
Date:
Dec 28, 1955
Volume:
Canadian Film Weekly (Dec 28, 1955)
Leaf #:
00023
Language:
English
Collection:
Global Cinema, Canada, and Hollywood Studio System
Format:
periodicals
Contributor:
Media History Digital Library, Greig Dymond in memory of David Dymond, 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:
May 23, 2024
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Westrex is film-pulled and re quires no_ special lubrication or maintenance. Write or ask for complete details. DOMINION SOUND Equipments Limited HEAD OFFICE: BRANCHES AT: 4040 St. Catherine Street West, Montreal. Halifax, Saint John, Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton, London, North Bay, Winnipeg, Regina, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver. OS-55-22 December 28, 1955 Fox, Disney Capture First Edison Awards The first National Media Award of the Thomas Alva Edison Foundation for the film best serving the national interest went to 20th-Fox’ A Man Called Peter. Walt Disney’s The African Lion, distributed in Canada by EmpireUniversal, took the prize for the best science film for youth. The best children’s film was Arne Sucksdorff’s The Great Adventure. Charles Edison, honorary president of the Foundation, made the awards at a dinner in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, New York, saying that A Man Called Peter gave foreign audiences a truer picture of American life than most films. The Foundation’s president, Charles F. Kettering, in presenting the science awards, said there was a great need of such films. MGM Signs Actress Anna Kashfi, beautiful young native of India who makes her American screen debut with Spencer Tracy in The Mountain, has been signed to a long-term MGM contract. Born in Calcutta, Miss Kashfi appeared in two Indian pictures prior to going to England in 1953. THE DOMINION ELECTIONS ACT, 1938 Electoral District of Spadina SUMMARY OF RETURN OF ELECTION EXPENSES There is below set out, as required by Section 63 (5) of The Dominion Elections Act, a = summary, signed by the official agent, of the return of election expenses made to me by him on behalf of SAMUEL GODFREY, one of the candidates at the recent election of a member to serve in the House of Commons of Canada held in the above-mentioned electoral district, which said return is on file at my office and may, on payment of a fee of twenty cents, be there inspected and _ extracts taken therefrom at anv reasonable time durina the six months next after the 7th day of December, 1955, being the day upon which the said return was furnished to me. Dated ct Toronto this 7th day of December, 1955, JOHN A. KINSELLA, Returning Officer. 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