We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
[NDEPEND
XHIBITOR
FILM BULLETIN
CRIMINAL INDICTMENTS
AND GENTLEMEN'S AGREEMENTS!
The movie industry stands today on the brink of the most momentous events in its history. Whether the indictments returned against Warner Bros., Paramount and R.K.O. and their subsidiaries and executives by a federal grand jury in St. Louis result in convictions, one thing is certain: the Dictatorship of the Eight Major Film Companies over the 13,000 independent exhibitors is at an end.
The anti-trust action by the Department of Justice is the result of public clamor for reform in the trade. The plight of the little independents has enlisted the sympathy and support of liberty-loving elements in all walks of life who see in the continued and uncontrolled oppression of the independent theatremen a threat to the existence of ALL small business men. Assurances given by the President at the time the movie code was being drafted that the interests of the small exhibitor would be protected are being translated into action.
The widely-read Walter Lippmann sums up the public attitude toward the controversy by declaring the need to be the invoking of the antitrust laws and the creation of new legislation to break the power of the producers. This opinion is shared by most liberal-minded Congressional and civic leaders.
If the monopoly action by the Government results in radical legislation in Congress curbing the power of the Eight Majors — the film men will have no one to blame but themselves. The denial of a fair share of product to
the independent, the sky-rocketing of film rentals, the increase in clearance granted the chains whenever they demanded it, the arbitrary dictation to the exhibitor of the conditions under which he could play pictures, the lopsided "Standard Exhibition Contract" — all these were made possible only by "Gentlemen's Agreements" among the big shots in the trade.
Block booking is doomed! The Code will undoubtedly be revised. Some sort of Congressional or Administrative action to protect the public interest and the little fellow in the trade will undoubtedly follow St. Louis. The leaders in the Independent Movement, after years of discouragement, are at last beginning to see daylight. Their struggle for reform in the industry is winning the support of the public and recognition from the authorities at Washington. A new day is dawning for the independent.
In this territory it is altogether likely that a couple of important antitrust actions will be started within the next few weeks by independent exhibitors who have exhausted every avenue of peaceful settlement of their grievances. Monopoly is more rampant here than probably anywhere else in the United States.
Those independent theatremen who have been refusing to join the IEPA unless the affiliated theatres, with their producer connection, were also admitted to membership, may now change their opinion as the result of the notoriety created by the Department of Justice action.
m m
c
O) CD CD_ (D
CD
I (D
Q-TJ
CD CD Q_ ZD
2 8
ZD
CD
Q_ m
_ X
O 2:
CD O
~TJ co
O
8 m
O
ZD
O
CO
CD
3
a> on
— \
— Z
5 CD
CD $
CD
00 CD
co ^ CD