Harrison's Reports (1929)

Entered as second-olaes matter Jamiaiy 4, 1921, at the post office at New Tork, New York, under the act of March 3, 1879. Harrison’S Reports Y early Subscription Bates : United States $10.00 U. S. Insular Possessions 12.00 Canada and Mesico. . 12.00 England and New Zealand . . . 14.60 Other Foreign Countries ............ 16.50 26c. a Copy 1440 BROADWAY New York, N. Y. A Motion Picture Reviowm^ Servloe by a Former Exhibitor Devoted l^otusively to the Interests of Exhibitors Its Editorial Policy: No Problem Too Big for Its Editorial Columns, if It is to Benefit the Exhibitor. Published Weekly by P. S. HARBISON Editor and Publisher Established July 1, 1919 Tel. : Pennsylvania 7649 Cable Address : Harreports (Bentley Code) A REVIEWING SERVICE FREE FROM THE INFLUENCE OF FILM ADVERTISING Vol. XI S ATWDA JANUARY 19, 1 929 No. 3 WHAT PRICE FILTH! Mr. Will H. Hays was hired by the producers and distributors of motion pictures to cleanse the screen, to purge it of immoral themes. That is, at least, what the public was told at the time the producers hired him. It was in 1921, I believe, when William Brady, the head of the National Association of the Motion Picture Industry, the predecessor of the Hays organization, gave out the famous fourteen points, which put the producers into a hole, because those points admitted by implication that the screen w'as unclean and the fourteen points would help to cleanse it. As a result of that act, agitation against motion pictures by reformers with demands by them for censorship became the greatest. To suppress such agitation and to prevent the enactment of legislation became their one aim. Mr. Brady could not bring about such a result; he had tried but failed. Another man was needed, a person with national reputation. Hence the selection of Mr. Will H. Hays. Mr. Hays was a cabinet minister at that time, and naturally commanded respect among the greatest part of the American public, particularly among the church element, because of his church affiliation. The truth of the matter is that, as subsequent events proved, the producers hired Mr. Hays to use him only as a window dressing ; to make the reformers and the religious people believe that they meant seriously to cleanse the screen but really to continue their old practices, unmolested this time, because of the prestige of Mr. Hays. Do you want evidence of it ? Look over the annual releases of pictures since Mr. Hays’ entry into this industry and you will be convinced of this fact; you will find that there has been as much immorality in pictures as there was before his entry. The only difference is that today immorality is introduced more subtly, more “artistically,” to use the language of the producers ; the “message” today is concealed under the cloak of respectability and in lavish environment. Nevertheless, its influence to the young is just as demoralizing. Not that Mr. Hays has been the cause of sex pictures — I doubt if he w'ants to see them produced himself ; he simply cannot stop them, because the members of his organization will not listen to him. He bans books and plays; but that does not prevent the members of his organization from making pictures out of them just the same. Fifty per cent, of the outstanding motion pic tures that are produced today are founded on a sex theme of some sort. And this percentage will not decrease, in spite of the fact that the producers, at every mention of screen immorality, point out to Mr. Hays as the symbol of screen purity. Do you want proof of this? Let us examine the facts ! A great part of the inhabitants of the big cities are not, as we well know, averse to sex pictures ; and as the producers own or control theatres in about eighty per cent, of the choice locations in the big cities, it is natural that they should want to make pictures that will draw in these theatres. But the “Bible Belt,” “The Great Heart of America,” as Mr. Richard Watts, the eminent motion picture critic of the New York Tribune, has called the Americans of the Interior, particularly of the rural districts, do not want this kind of pictures ; the fathers and mothers of the future American generation do not want their children to see pictures of this sort. They have the right to object. But the producers, who, as said, own theatres in the choice locations in the big cities, say to them : “That is the kind of pictures you and your children are going to see, because that is the kind of pictures that make money for us.” And these mothers and fathers, and millions like them in the big cities as well, voice their protest against such pictures by staying away from picture theatres, and causing their children to stay away from them, too. And the box offices of the theatre owners in those sections suffer, in spite of the fact that they are innocent parties. Since the big cities like sex pictures and the small towns and the rural districts do not, the proper thing for the producers to do would be to let each section of the country have what it wants ; the big cities could have their sex pictures, and the neighborhoods of big cities, the small cities, and the rural districts may have their clean pictures. But will they stand for such a policy? They will not ! That is what, at least, experience has proved ; they want the exhibitor to buy either all their pictures or none, in spite of the fact that some pictures of a group may be totally unsuited for his custom. The producers do not want a change, despite the assertions of Mr. Hays to the contrary. Do you want proof of it? You know that last year a bill was introduced in Congress by Senator Brookhart to forbid the sale of pictures before they are made and to {Continued on last page)