The Film Daily (1943)

Friday, May 14, 1943 "&$* DAILY Ballin Sees Boom For Post-War Tele Television unquestionably will blossom out as a major industry af♦ ~"\the war ends, it was predicted .) night by Will Baltin, program director of Du Mont television station, W2XWV, speaking before members of the American Television Society at the Hotel Capitol. Factors behind Baltin's prediction include economical operation, plus low-cost equipment, compact and flexible cameras and major developments in the field of electronics. ■'You'll see television stations mushroom across the nation," he said, •'even to small communities of modest means." "Theater television, to which millions will flock to see events of national, and, perhaps international importance, is as certain as the dawn of tomorrow," he continued. "New developments in the laboratory indicate that this form of entertainment is going to electrify the amusement world in much the same manner as the talking picture did back in the late 1920's." Baltin noted that television screens no longer will be limited in size and said that various sizes designed for homes and schools will be placed on the market at prices comparable to an average radio-phonograph combination. Regional stations, he continued, are the logical first expansion step and these will eventually be linked in a chain or series of chains spreading acrost the country. Baltin told of the variety shows televised at the Du Mont station and explained in detail how these programs are handled by a staff numbering less than a dozen persons. He analyzed program production and dissected all types of entertainment to show how television programs may best be devised for mass audience appeal. Chicago News Increases Saturday Movie Space Chicago — The Chicago Daily News has increased its space for film news in the Saturday issue. Carl Guldager is now film editor. WB Film Tip-Off: Watch the Atlantic The Roosevelt Churchill Casablanca Conference ushered in Warners' "Casablanca." With the opening of "Mission to Moscow," Joseph E. Davies departs on a second Mission to Moscow for President Roosevelt. Next Friday Warners will premiere "Action in the North Atlantic" at the New York Strand. The tip going around is: Watch the North Atlantic. ▼ ▼ ▼ Eighth Army and Tenth Ave: • • • THREE related events yesterday were the center of elation over at the 20th-Fox headquarters of Promotional Generalissimo Hal Home One was the radioed dispatch from Allied Headquarters in North Africa that "complete victory and the end of the North African campaign came when resistance by the German African armies and their Italian partners collapsed All of Africa is now in the hands of the triumphant British, American and French troops" Second event was the termination of the local Globe Theater run of "Desert Victory," and the elation was evoked by the engagement's superlative success, paving the way for widespread booking of the film in the Metropolitan territory and thereby adding to the big grosses the opus is piling-up nationally "Desert Victory," of course, is the motion picture record of the trouncing which the so-called Desert Fox and his forces received at the hands of the British Eighth Army, — from the decisive action at El Alamein to the occupation of Tripoli, — which phase set the stage for the final German-Italian debacle in Tunisia Third event was the anticipated arrival on the Mediterranean scene of Lieut. Colonel David Macdonald, commander of the British Army Film and Photographic Unit which filmed "Desert Victory" With that capable officer, who won the admiration and affection of all our industryites with whom he came in contact during his recent visit to the U. S., back now in the battle area, he will commence compilation of "Tunisian Victory," the sequel to "Desert Victory," — and 20th-Fox hopes to distribute that pic, too This time, the valiant Macdonald will have access to U. S. Signal Corps footage, and probably that obtained by the French, to augment the considerably more than 150,000 feet of actual action taken by some two-score cameramen of his own Eighth Army Film Unit during the Tunisian campaign And the British First Army likewise will have a flock of footage T T ▼ • • • FAIRLY recently, one of our Official Washington bigwigs declared that it wouldn't be long before pic stands on the U. S. home front received footage which would knock patrons out of their seats Exactly that has come to pass with the release of "Desert Victory" From main title to final fade-out, the production's spectacular scenes grip audiences as no previous war film has done. .... ■ That's because everything in it is the McCoy The sequences depicting the night barrage at El Alamein, and the close-ups of the waiting infantrymen's faces, are alone worth roadshow scales to see From the local Globe, "Desert Victory" moves over to the RKO May fair today In many of the Skouras outlets, the picture found itself billed with "My Friend Flicka" or the 20th-Fox musical, "Hello, Frisco, Hello" And that pattern is being followed by hosts of alert showmen o'er the land T T ▼ • • • FEW films in industry annals pack the timeliness, interest, exploitability, and important ready-made tie-ups for b.o. biz, as does "Desert Victory" WPB has sent posters to 23,000 factories from coast to coast, adding impetus to the spontaneous desire of management and labor everywhere to have the picture play their locales A literal avalanche of inquiries has descended upon 20th-Fox, asking when the pic is coming' to particular towns Rightly, smart showmen are on the gimme trail of "Desert Victory" with the same avidity as the Eighth Army was its quarry T T '▼ • • • AVENGE PEARL HARBOR!