Canadian Film Weekly (Dec 24, 1958)

Page scan 00038 from Canadian Film Weekly

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Film Weekly
Date:
Dec 24, 1958
Volume:
Canadian Film Weekly (Dec 24, 1958)
Leaf #:
00038
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 15, 2024
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Christmas Number ond such gathering since organization of the association in 1950. George S. Enos of New Brunswick is elected to succeed P. J. A. Fleming of Alberta as chairman. Discussion centres around uniformity of classification, age limits for attendance, censorship, restricted categories and nitrate films. The censors undertake rapid and close exchange of information on controversial films. Robert H. Brooks is named to succeed Herbert Alpert as president of the Canadian Society of Cinematographers at the second annual meeting in Toronto. The organization now numbers 50 members. A member of a family identified with motion pictures in the Maritimes for over half a century and operator of the Empress and Capitol in Amherst, NS, for many years, Mrs. Frank Audas, 63, passes at the home of her daughter in Hudson, Quebec. Capital stock of Mavety Film Delivery is acquired by Aurora Leasing Corporation, which previously had a truck-rental arrangement with Mavety’s. George Altman stays on as general manager and no changes in personnel are contemplated. Six members of the present crew ‘and 12 new candidates are nominated at the monthly meeting of ‘the Toronto Variety Club. In November the elections take place and before the end of the year the ll-man crew names Dan Krendel the new Chief Barker, John J. Fitzgibbons, Jr., First Assistant Chief Barker and Phil Stone Second Assistant Chief Barker. Quarterly meeting of the Association of Motion Picture Producers and Laboratories of Canada in PEE ELE EE EE EEE NE EEE PHOTO ENGRAVERS AND ELECTROTYPERS LTD FE AS PS PES EEE SE IL EEE EEE CANADIAN FILM WEEKLY Page 39 News Roundup Montreal votes to allow suppliers to hold sustaining membership, decides to set up a speaker’s bureau, supports its Industry Development Committee in its desire to seek government aid in creating a bigger and stronger film industry in Canada and asks for a larger share of departmental film expenditures, most of which the National Film Board now gets. A veteran of 40 years in the Canadian film industry, Clifford E. Yonson, 58, vice-president of General Theatre Supply, dies in Toronto. S. W. Caldwell Limited holds the first of its series of lectures and demonstrations in a monthly workshop for the Women’s Advertising Club of Toronto. Canadian exhibitors are hopeful that the Small Business Branch of the Department of Trade and Commerce, now being formed, will be a means of influencing sympathetic consideration for their problems although the SBB has no intention of carrying out a program of financial assistance. Doris Robert of Granby is returned as president of Quebec Allied Theatrical Industries and all incumbent officers are also reelected at the annual meeting in Montreal. Columbia Pictures sets up deal with Associated Screen Industries to handle physical distribution of its product for the Montreal branch, Other companies are said to be negotiating for similar moves. Humanitarian Award of Variety Clubs International for 1957 goes to Konrad Adenauer, chancellor of Western Germany. Wife of Famous Players’ director of public relations and a veteran newspaperwoman long connected with national and _ local women’s press clubs, Mrs. Kathleen Nairn passes in Toronto after a long illness. December Survey of the reaction to the announcement that the Canadian motion picture industry wants Sunday movies shows that most of it is favorable and many newspapers support it with editorials. Opposition has been generally limited, with what there is of it coming from the expected quarters. Pioneer of the Year in 1957 and an old-time vaudeville actor and musician, William A. Summerville, 80, dies in Toronto after a lengthy illness. A distinguished politician, he served as an alderman, a controller and a Member of Provincial Parliament in Toronto. He built the Prince of Wales Theatre in 1923 and was connected with the motion picture business since that time. Sid Sniderman is appointed 16 mm. sales manager of IFD. Tyrone Power, 44, dies of a heart attack on the set of Solomon and Sheba in Madrid, Spain. Between 12 to 15 features will be added to the releasing schedule of Rank Film Distributors of Canada Limited through an agreement signed in London with Lion International Films. Previously Lion International product was released in Canada by International Film Distributors. Arthur Kelly’s 42-minute, 16 mm. film about Canadian participation in the Dieppe raid in World War II, This Most Gallant Affair, is given a posh Canadian premiere at the Capitol, Brantford. World premiere took place in Dieppe, France, earlier and was attended by over 70 Canadian Dieppe veterans. American Congress of Exhibitors, a USA counterpart of Canada’s National Committee of Motion Picture Exhibitors Associations, is organized in New York with the setting up of a 26-man working committee. Mervyn Rosenzweig is appointed aide to Sydney Banks, executive producer and v-p of S. W. Caldwell Limited. Toronto’s 2,000 members of Local 112, United Auto Workers, unanimously pass a resolution calling for a more open Sunday permitting “symphony and musical concerts, ballet, plays and motion pictures.”’ Ralph C. Ellis, g-m of Fremantle of Canada Limited, is named president of the company. Rumors persist that offers have been made by interested parties for acquisition of the Famous Players stock held by Paramount Pictures. Plausibility is lent to the reports by the fact that Famous Players has been examining its SERRE EEE EEE ETE EE EES s . Al Christmas Greetings TOM DALEY EGLINTON THEATRE == TORONTO Voor RIRIREERE PRE LL LL LEE OEE EE IE EL LL LL Le EE Wb Ra Pa a Ps Pe Ps Pa a a Pa PS PSS PPS PPR resources with a view to expanding its committments in the broadcasting field. This it cannot do because of the restrictions of the broadcasting act, which require that 75 per cent of stock of companies applying for broadcasting licences be held by Canadians, unless control of the company is given up by Paramount. Alberta projectionists oppose ban of nitrate film before the special advisory committee, meeting in Calgary to hear briefs from various industry and _non-industry sources in regards to changes in the Alberta Amusements Act. Asked are elimination or reduction of the amusement tax, ban on nitrate film and a separate censorship appeal board. Odeon sues for $1,000,000 for damage caused to its Ottawa theatre by a recent explosion believed to have been caused by escaping gas. Founder of Confederation Theatres in Montreal and a veteran of the industry, N. L. Lawand, 63, dies in that city. Suggestion that the Quebec ban on children under 16 attending movies is near repeal is advanced by Quebec Allied Theatrical Industries’ officers. James A. Cowan is returned as president of the Canadian Film Institute at the annual meeting in Ottawa, which names Mrs. I. A. Mackie assistant director and reelects Charles Topshee executive director, Gaudry Delisle and A. L. Hepworth vice-presidents and L. F. MacRae honorary treasurer. Eliot Hyman, Herbert L. Golden and Henry J. Zittau, all of New York, are added to the board of United Telefilms Limited of Canada. ii 5 5 4 A 4 Joseph B. 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