Exhibitors Daily Review and Motion Pictures Today (Jan-Jun 1930)

6 Exhibitors DAILY REVIEW and Motion Pictures TODAY, THURSDAY, MARCH 13, 1930 GERMAN SOUND MONOPOLY BELIEVED NEARING ITS END (Special Correspondence) BERLIN, March 12— The S. S. Acquitania, due in New York harbor on Tuesday, March 18, carries German picture industry hopes of early negotiations in America that will end, or at least minimize, the long period of depression due to the European rivalry between the Western Electric Company and German sound apparatus interests. The most powerful individual in Europe associated with the ownership of sound patents as owner and manufacturer-financier will FOREIGN PR0BLEI\» (Continued from page 1 ) just returned from New York. Discussing the company’s foreign plans said: “There is no truth in the report that Paramount are seeking studios in England nor contemplate production here themselves. Paramount will, however, finance dialogue production in France, probably in the Gaumont studios near Paris, where French talking pictures and probably Spanish and Italian dialogue versions will be made. Mr. Robert Kane will probably produce there for Paramount. French story originals will be used and French artists, but there is not sufficient justification in the return from these pictures to make them on a very big scale. Xot TVorried by Germany Eighty-three percent of the income from American pictures comes from the English-speaking market, and the wall erected by Germany against U. S. talking films owing to the patents trouble was not seriously disturbing America. “There is no fear of wide film stampeding the industry. Producers in America are going slow with a full ,3;ealization of the need of standardization. “Germany have put themselves in this position,” said Mr. Graham. “They have built a wall around themselves, and are trying to assume the position that they can get along without the rest of the world. Their ability to make high-priced productions for their own market alone must be doubted. Whv should we borrow a lot of grief and trouble by going in there, when costs of nroduction are high and returns doubtful?” Reports current in the industry, and published in at least one trade paper yesterday, that Sam Katz was on his way to Europe to take an active part in completing negotiations ip connection with the financing of the foreign language films with Robert Kane in Paris, were denied at Mr. Katz office here. Katz it was declared by A. R. Thurman, his secretary, is new in Hollywood with Adolph Zukor, and will have no hand in the foreign producing situation. All other local Paramount executives are at the Paramount-Publix sales drive convention in Chicago. be aboard the Acquitania — and it is Europe’s next move, with New York the logical scene. This individual is Herr Heinrich Kuchenmeister, of Holland, who has acquired large interests in the German monopoly of KlangfilmTobis. Herr Kuchenmeister is known to favor a sound patents entente between Europe and America of a nature that will end the war with Western Electric. Moreover, he was a friendly intermediary in connection with negotiations between Warner Brothers and Tobis whereby it is said that the American producers hoped to secure a favorable and permanent foothold for German distribution of their films. Negotiations Still Pending WTiatever has been the result of these negotiations, they were conducted on the American side by George E. Quigley, a high official in the Warner organization, and Milton Diamond, one of their New York attorneys. Both of these emissaries of the Warners in Germany are of the Kuchenmeister party bound for New York on the Acquitania. Otherwise the pall hanging over the film industry here grows continuaily heavier. By reason of the feeling of security, which the possession of basic patents gives, the Germans are asking a huge sum for rights which are by no means essential, even if desirable to the Western Electric Company; in natural retaliation the Americans have refused to buy German sound films, and as the Western Electric is to a very large extent dominant in the American theatre reproducing apparatus, the exclusion for practical purposes is complete. German Capital Scarce It costs a lot to make talking pictures, and capital in Germany— for such risky enterprise as film production— is scarce; not only is money for production scarce, but the market available for German speaking pictures (of the scale on which the Germans are fond of producing) is exceedingly small, even assuming that the producing company controls theatres as well. No German tone film can hope to pay from the German version alone; Financially, it might be said that the English versions are more important than the German. Quotation of figures vary very widely (as in all moving-picture communities), but the consensus of opinion seems to have it that a reasonably successful sound film costing perhaps 800,000 reichsmarks ($200,000) cannot even bring back its money out of Germany alone. Therefore the cinema industry in Germany is dependent upon foreign markets for its successful continuation. Gutting Own Throats The point of the whole war is that, by trying to bring the Western Electric to terms, and hence keeping themselves out of the Cultural Influence of Talkies Discussed by J. L Warner American market, the Germans are cutting their own throats. How much longer it will last depends upon how long the Germans can pretend to ignore the financial pressure; the screws are going tighter every day. Germany is not vital to the continued prosperous activity of the Western Electric; but the Ameriman market is the sine q-aa non of the contiiiuation of important activity in Germany. The inevitable crisis is fast being reached. The UFA, having ventured heavily in sound film production, not only by erecting an enormous sound studio at Neubabelsberg, but by the production of six major sound films (which are now all at least in the cutting stage), has called a threemonths’ pause in production, the time to be mainly used in preparing the six films for foreign markets by nachsynchronization. Paralyzing Uncertainty Uncertainty one meets everywhere, and many who have been employed in any of the six are now out of work. The small companies, of which there are a number, which cater principally to local tastes, cannot think of risking the amounts of money involved in tone film production, with the whole industry so depressed, and the future so uncertain. “SARAH AND SON” A FINE FILM All elements entering into the production of ‘Sarah and Son” are fine, separately and in combination. The sound screen adaptation of Timothy Shea’s novel makes a strong and human story, Dorothy Arzner’s direction is intelligent, the supporting cast is excellent, and Ruth Chatterton as the heroine — playing with a slight and very engaging German accent — is a delight to both eye and ear. Philippe de Lacy will establish himself in the hearts of all mothers and most fathers for the truest boy character in a drama of emotion seen on the screen in a long time. The picture, which was previewed yesterday noon at the Criterion, will open its engagement at the Paramount, Broadway and Brooklyn, tomorrow. Exhibitors seeing “Sarah and Son” will book it with easy minds; others will not be taking any chances in so doing because people will tell each other — and that will settle it. C. D. Warner Brothers’ plan to produce full-length grand operas and Shakespeare, to use the screen as a cultural medium of far-reaching influence, and to build theatres of an entirely new type, was discussed by J. L. Warner in an interview with Vera L. Connolly, published in the current issue of the Delineator. Among the significant statements made by the producer is the belief that through the talking screen English will be accepted as a universal language. The talkies are responsible, too, Mr. Warner states, for the new high level of taste reached by audiences today. Finer Things Coming “To be sure,” he admits, ’’there will alw'ays be girl shows, vaudeville skits, lowbrow hokum of all kinds — on the screen as on the stage. These things are good for the box office. They enable us to undertake the finer things, for instance, pictures like our current production, ‘Disraeli’, with George Arliss. “Yet people thought we were crazy when we decided to produce ‘Disraeli’. The most dismal prophecies were made. It was too highbrow, we were told, it was : over the heads of the crowd. To \ day ‘Disraeli’ is proving one of our biggest money-makers. And this shows, doesn’t it, that there is a market for the better type of | thing — the artistic thing? Shakespeare, the operas, the best things in drama and literature and music — gradually these can be trans i ferred to the audible screen . Then the millions will enjoy them, instead of the privileged few. Imagine the effect this will have ! on world viewpoints. On culture.” S. WITTMAN PROMOTED (Continued from page 1) Taylor, western Sales Manager. There will be five assistant sales managers under Schlangetr and Taylor, and Wittman, who is assistant under Schlanger, is the first to be appointed. He will have headquarters in New York, and will handle the sale of product to circuits, and, in addition, nvill supervise the Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Washington exchanges. SilM^ of Philadelphia of Washington vnuc tnbR of New York. Albany and Buffalo ‘The Pride of the East Coast 99 The “Home Town Papers” of 4,600 theatre owners. The most intensively read journals in the ind u s t r y — Keeping everlastingly at it for the 12th successive year. 100% coverage of a 35% territory! iMANUEL-GOODWIN PUBLICATIONS New York — Philadelphia — Washington 4ain Office, 219 N. BROAD ST., PHILA.