Canadian Film Weekly (Feb 13, 1970)

Page scan 0000 from Canadian Film Weekly

Record Details:

Title:
Canadian Film Weekly
Date:
Feb 13, 1970
Volume:
Canadian Film Weekly (Feb 13, 1970)
Leaf #:
0000
Language:
English
Collection:
Hollywood Studio System, Global Cinema, and Canada
Format:
periodicals
Contributor:
Media History Digital Library, Canadian Media Magazines Project, 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:
April 11, 2024
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PUBLISHED BY THE MOTION PICTURE INSTITUTE OF CANADA Toronto, February 13, 1970 Not again? “That more features made by the National Film Board of Canada will be flowing into the American market than at any time in the past was predicted yesterday by David Novek, director of the publicity division of the National Film Board.” The item above was recently printed in an American trade paper and is part of a report of a statement made at a press luncheon for the launching of “Prologue”, the latest NFB feature. We should have thought with the present financial squeeze and the numerous complaints about the firing of staff at the NFB, there would be precious little left in its budget for the production of feature films. If the above statement is to be believed, other features are presently in the planning stage. The record of the NFB to date on feature production, from a financial viewpoint, has not been so successful as to merit further programming. Actually, it points to disaster. On the other side of the coin, the Canadian Film Development Corporation is trying to sponsor feature film development and is encouraging competent private enterprise to engage in it. Both organizations are arms of the same parent body and in point of fact, the chairman of the NFB is a member of the board of the Canadian Film Development Corporation. If the NFB engages in feature film production, it does so on an inequitable competitive basis. It is the owner of vast quantities of production equipment already paid for by government funds, plus a film lab. It has people employed whose salaries may be charged in other areas and the result must be that it is unfairly impinging on what should primarily be a private enterprise area. Since the annual budget of the NFB has been frozen because of governmental austerity measures, it (Continued on Page 2) Lloyd Burns appointed Screen Gems’ exec. vp. Lloyd Burns has been appointed executive vice-president of Screen Gems, succeeding John H. Mitchell who was recently named president of the company. Burns will continue to serve as president of Screen Gems International and as vicepresident of Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. Screen Gems is the television production and distribution division of Columbia Pictures Industries. Under Burns’ leadership, Screen Gems International has developed Shown above is the prototype of Famous Flayers’ new Mini-Cine theatres, prefab’ structures designed to service isolated communities throughout Canada. The prototype has been de-sectionalized, packaged and shipped to the Ontario Hydro power dam site at Lower Notch, about 30 miles south of Haileybury, Ont. where it will be reassembled for a premiere 16 mm. feature showing Mar. 1. It will be the first installation of its kind in Canada, serving the power dam one of the largest sales operations in the industry, distributing program series and feature films to 99 countries around the globe. Additionally, the company initiated a construction community of 1,000 inhabitants who now have to travel 35 miles to the nearest permanent moviehouse in Cobalt, Ont. Famous Players to open first Mini-Ciné on Mar. 1 First of Famous Players’ 180seat Mini-Ciné units — prefab’ structures designed to serve remote, theatre-less communities throughout Canada — is scheduled to open March 1 location known as the Lower Notch Generating Station, an Ontario Hydro power dam site at the junction of Lake Temiskaming and the Montreal River, about 30 miles south of Haileybury. A. E. (Bert) Brown, supervisor of Famous’ Mini-Ciné operations, said components would shortly be shipped from Toronto to the dam site where a work crew provided by the dam-builders — C. A. Pitts Construction (Ontario), McNamara Construction and Atlas Construction — would assemble the Lshaped structure in time for the March target date. At peak construction periods, the Lower Notch community numbers 1,000 and is expected to be on location well into 1971 before the new dam is completed. Meanwhile the Mini-Ciné, installed at Famous Players’ expense on land provided by Ontario Hydro, is expected to fill a major entertainment gap. The nearest permanent moviehouse is in Cobalt, 35 miles away. in a northern Ontario’ full program of production in Canada and Australia. Many of the program formats developed in these countries will be offered for sale in the United States. Burns, a Canadian, first became affiliated with Screen Gems in this country in 1955, when he helped to organize the company’s Canadian subsidiary, Screen Gems (Canada) Ltd. Three years later he went to New York as vice-president in charge of Screen Gems International. In 1966, he was named president of-the division. One 16 mm. showing of a current release is planned each evening but it’s possible that the building might also serve the community as an auxiliary recreation or assembly hall for afternoon social events or business meetings. (Continued on Page 5) Main auditorium of Famous Players’ new Mini-Ciné theatre is 24 feet wide by 64 feet deep and can accommodate 180 seats. The rows of foam-rubber chairs are staggered and the reinforced, insulated wooden floor is gently ramped to provide excellent sightlines from anywhere in the theatre. The tongue-in-groove, insulated metal walls are color-coordinated in orange and gold with the vinyl and fabric seating. Heating is provided from an oil or gas-fired furnace.