Documentary News Letter (1944-1945)

CONTENTS QUOTA QUICKIES AGAIN 97 THE B.F.I. PROPOSES 98 NOTES OF THE MONTH 99 THE PARIS SCIENTIFIC FILM CONFERENCE (John Maddison) 100 FILM REVIEWS 102 TWO INDIAN FILMS 103 NEWS FROM EGYPT 104 SALESMANSHIP? 104 FILM SOCIETIES 105 CORRESPONDENCE 105 BOOK REVIEW 105 CATALOGUE OF M.O.I. FILMS MADE IN 1944 106 INDICES FOR VOL. V. (1944-1945) 108 ARMY FILM UNIT PRODUCTIONS 109 OL. 5 1945 Fiftieth Issue by Film Centre, 34 Soho Square, London w.l ONE SHILLING QUOTA "QUICKIES AGAIN NE of the most awful experiences that can happen to a cinema-goer lese days is to be caught in a cinema waiting for the big film and ave to sit through half an hour of a dud second feature. There are quite a number of small British companies making lese films — one shown in the West End the other day didn't have a tot in it under fifty feet in length and every foot of film that had sen shot, including camera flashes and dud pans, had been used, nquiries showed that the total cost of the film was just over £400 >r a cut negative of 3,450 ft. The producers' share of the receipts as reckoned to be about £2,000. Another film of this type — a udio production this time — 4,000 ft. in length, the subject a detecve story, was shot in four days on one set, the set being re-papered •id redressed each night. The total cost £1,400. In some ways you in admire the people who make such films when one thinks of the nicky indecision, poor planning and overspending that goes on in a »t of studios, but even so this type of film is damaging the industry id should be stopped. But for every film of this type produced in Britain, there must be venty-five produced in America. By the time the dud American :cond features, and this means about 90 per cent of them, arrive .i England, they have paid for themselves three, four, or five times ver, and the distributors can afford to give them away to the chibitors for practically nothing. In Wardour Street to-day you can uy the British distribution rights of a five-reel American second ature for £20. And so we arrive at the reason for the demand for the very leapest second features. Films for renters' quota are of course rotected by a cost clause which keeps the standard of the producon fairly high, but there is no similar control for exhibitors' quota. >uota films are in short supply and the market is flooded with bad merican products at "throw away" prices — so small British commies, interested only in the profits, knock reels of junk together hich qualify for exhibitors' quota. Now what is the feeling of British producers, renters and chibitors? The big producers are quite happy, because the drearier jie second feature the less the money it receives and of course the 'lore the big pictures take. As production and renting are so closely Bd together, the renters are happy too. But what about the exhibitors? They know that these films drive Udiences to sleep and they would rather not show them, but they jiy they must in order to make up the quota against all the dud American second features. If you ask them why they have to buy British quota from the gutters they answer "We have to buy in the cheapest market. We're not philanthropists!" You may even ask, "Why show the American second features when no one wants to see them?" but if you do the exhibitor will go white and might possibly have a heart attack, for what you are suggesting is a single feature programme. And although exhibitors know that audiences don't want to see these films, they believe that a single feature programme will keep their "patrons", as they call us, out. Now how do these British-made junk second features directly harm the industry? First, production. Decent second features could be an ideal training ground, especially for key technicians such as script writers, directors, cameramen, recordists and editors and, of course, as a try-out ground for actors. (If you are producing a film for a hundred thousand pounds you think twice before giving a promising but untried youngster the job as director, or an unknown actress one of the leading parts. But if one of the big studios, apart from its ordinary production schedule, made, say, five films a year at £15,000 each — £75,000 in all, just the cost of one mediumsized film — they would be making an investment that would be repaid a thousand times over.) Second, exhibition. Audiences can't be bothered with these films. They cough, talk, go to sleep or walk out, and when you hear some one complaining about British films being bad, it is usually one of these that they are talking about. Which can be summed up as — they give the British production industry a bad name ; they discourage people from going to the pictures. The position to-day is very similar to that in 1938 before the present Quota Act was passed. Then the American distributors were commissioning quota quickies which counted for renters' and exhibitors' quota. There was no part of the act which controlled the price or quality of such films, and they very nearly finished the production industry off. It was only the introduction of the cost clause for renters" quota in the new Quota Act that saved it. Immediately a renter had to prove to the Board of Trade that £7,500 or £15,000 had been spent on labour, the quality of the films improved immediately. To-da"y there is no cost clause for exhibitors' quota. Judging by past experience it is about time that it was introduced; or, even better, in the next revision of the Quota Act, let us have a clause banning the double-feature programme.