Year book of motion pictures (1925)

otherwise to undermine governmental authority, brutality in any form, revolution and objectionable religious thenfts are severely censored and in some cases banned entirely. The picture business in the Orient is, as in America, seasonable. The monsoonial rains start in lapan during the month of June and sweep right across the Orient finishing in India about the end of October. During the summer months and the rainy season, attendances fall off considerably. The big business season starts as a rule in November and finishes in May. Programs Vary The length of programs vary — most countries of of Orient use about nine to ten thousand feet. The program in Japan, however, is sometimes as high as from twenty to twenty-five thousand feet. In the Phillipine Islands and Japan, they run continuous shows but in the other countries of the Orient they average two shows each evening with matinees on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays. Considerable space is given in the vernacular newspapers to movie news and the leading film distributors take a large amount of space for advertising their pictures as this is the main method in boosting pictures before and during their release. The Filipino is an ardent movie fan. He lives for today and, as a rule, is thriftless and prefers to spend his earnings on the movies, prize-fights, cock-fights, clothes and cheap jewelry. In Manila, a number of the leading houses run vaudeville in conjunction with their pictures which seems to be a very popular form of entertainment. In China, a very interesting development has taken place. In the first place, the percentage of Chinese attending foreign theaters in which American pictures are shown has increased from twenty-five to sixty per cent during the past two years, showing the popularity of American pictures with the educated Chinese. A number of Chinese productions have recently been presented in Chinese theaters and these have been enormously popu lar with the lower classes, more popular in fact than the American product for the reason that the Chinese productions naturally are patronized by much larger audiences. It is quite a common sight to see hundreds of well dressed Chinese drive off in their limousines after a performance. These people patronize the high price seats and as a rule they take their entire families with them and as the average wellto-do Chinaman has many wives, this family is often considerable. The recent floods in Tientsin and the present war in China are causing great confusion and hardship in all lines of business. Northern China particularly is greatly disorganized for these reasons. Production in China Plans are now being made for the production of Chinese pictures on a very large scale. These pictures will be presented in Chinese theaters only, not only in the treaty ports but throughout the interior of China. Several concerns in Shanghai have already built laboratories and considerable interest has been shown by the Chinese in applying for work in the picture production. One concern advertised for players and within twenty-four hours had received over five hundred applications for employment. The Japanese have made remarkable progress in rebuilding their theaters destroyed by the recent earthquake. In fact, between eighty and ninety per cent of the houses destroyed have been rebuilt. The rebuilt houses are temporary places constructed of wood. The reason for this being that the devastated area is being resurveyed and Tokyo and Yokohoma will be rebuilt on western lines. That is, they will have big broad streets and the type of building which will replace the present structures within the next two years will be of American design and construction. In the meantime, building permits are beinc1 given by the reconstruction board for temporary buildings onlv for the reason that most of these temporary build ings will have to be demolished when the plans for INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTORS of MOTION PICTURES EDWARD L, KLEIN COMPANY 25 WEST 43rd STREET NEW YORK, U. S. A. CABLE ADDRESS : KLEINWAY, NEW YORK TELEPHONES: VANDERBILT 2522 2523 FEATURES COMEDIES CARTOONS SOLE FOREIGN DISTRIBUTORS of FELIX, THE CAT ALICE COMEDIES REG'LAR KIDS COMEDIES — QUALITY PRODUCTIONS 664