The Independent Film Journal (1954)

Plan Cine-Miracle Film With Justice Department Okay Regional Meetings Hail COMPO National Audience Awards Poll Here are a few of the 150 industry toppers in the N. Y. exchange area who have enthusiastically pledged their support to COMPO's forthcoming National Audience Awards Poll. TOP, Elmer Rhoden, president. National Theatres and national chairman of the audience awards committee, addresses the assemblage. On the dias, L to R: Abe Montague, Columbia gen. sales mgr. and v-p; E. D. Martin, president, TOA; Emanuel Frisch, president, MMPTA; Rhoden; Harry Brandt, president, ITOA; Herman Robbins, president. National Screen Service; Herbert J. Yates, president. Republic. CENTER, L to R: Ray Moon (light suit), Stanley Kolbert, Murray Strausberg, Leo Brecher, Irwin Gold, Sam Rinzler, Martin Newman, Herman Becker, Walter Kaufman, Leslie Schwartz; BOTTOM, L to R: (foreground) Harry Kalmine, Sol Schwartz, Joseph Vogel, Gene Picker; (back¬ ground) Wilbur Snaper, John J. O'Connor, Richard Braus, David Levy, Robert W. Coyne. Regional exchange area meetings are being held in connection with COMPO’s National Audience Awards Poll and are generating great enthusiasm among industry representa¬ tives present. Indicative of the mounting interest in the poll was the enthusiasm shown at the New York exchange area get-together in New York, at which more than 150 top industry executives, including representatives from both exhibition and distribution, expressed their support of the audience awards. Guest of honor at the meeting was Elmer Rhoden, National Theatres president and national chairman of the poll committee. Describing his recent talks with Hollywood studio chiefs about the poll, Rhoden re¬ vealed the idea had generated “a wonderful response.” “If we had launched this pro¬ gram 20 years ago,” Rhoden assured his audience, “Hollywood would not have a player shortage today. I understand there are 25 pictures ready to roll which are being held up because of easting. If players, de¬ veloped through our poll, were available, it would mean an additional 25 pictures and $60 million more at the box office.” After the meeting, exhibitor leaders Emanuel Frisch, president, Metropolitan Motion Picture Theatre Assn., and Harry Brandt, president, Independent Theatre Owners Assn., sent personal messages to the distribution presidents and studio chiefs, as¬ suring them of exhibitor cooperation. Brandt wrote : Elmer Rhoden “told us that some of the production heads in Hollywood would like to make trailers to promote their new personalities but doubted that exhibitors would give these trailers playing time. “Please let me assure you that exhibition will cooperate and give choice playing time to such subjects. We are as anxious to pro¬ mote new personalities as you are to develop them,” Brandt wrote. It was requested at the meeting that exhibitor leaders urge their theatre managers to submit the first COMPO nominating ballots without delay. Of the (Continued on page 29) National Theatres president Elmer Rhoden has met with Justice Department officials in Washington about NT’s plans to finance their newly-announced Cine-Miracle process. The theatre executive believes that the Gov¬ ernment will offer no objection to financing by his organization, since it has already permitted financing of Cinerama by Stanley Warner Theatres. Rhoden also announced that NT will estab¬ lish a separate organization or will tie in with some existing independent company oi individuals to produce new films using CineMiracle, since NT has neither the experience nor the desire to make films. "Great Advances": Rhoden Cine-Miracle, the new Cinerama-style tech¬ nique for simultaneous photography of three' strips of film, announced in Hollywood aij few days earlier, will make possible “greai advances” in wide screen photography, ac¬ cording to Rhoden. It will be economical) and highly portable, and will enable three-li1 strip movies to be shown in “almost any! theatre.” The “big secret” of the new technique Rhoden said, is in the camera, where the] inventors have achieved a complete suppres¬ sion of the lines indicating the use of three! strips of film. “It suppresses the distracting joining line that has characterized the first picture of this kind, and it also overcomes the disturbing parrallax which has frequently seemed to make rivers run uphill in pic¬ tures,” he said. Since distribution of Cine-Miracle will be on a limited “road-show” basis, he said, aj distributing organization will not be needed According to Hollywood correspondent Richard Bernstein, who observed a demon¬ stration of the process at the Melrose Thea¬ tre, Los Angeles, Cine-Miracle was “impres sive” and showed a definite improvement ir the joining of the negative strips. Test foot age was in the form of a twTo-strip reel, h(| said, and while the dividing line betweer the two strips was visible, it was never dis trading. Ready In Six Months National Theatres is working with Smith Dieterich Corp. of New York towards devel opment of the equipment, which should b* available for filming entertainment feature; within six months, Rhoden stated. He hope; that “some day” when “Cinerama Holiday’ is in general release, NT will be permittee to roadshow “This Is Cinerama” in smal houses where regular-size installations can not be accommodated. Stanley Warner Theatres, producers an< distributors of Cinerama, had “no comment’ on Rhoden’s proposal. They already have ii production mobile units for carrying “Thi; Is Cinerama” and subsequent releases t< small houses. Another wide screen development callec Circarama was demonstrated at the Wal Disney studio. In Circarama, the spectato stands inside a round enclosure completed encircled by a 360 degree screen and look at a picture entirely surrounding him. No! intended for theatre use at this time, Ciri carama uses 11 synchronized cameras am projectors and will be among the free at tractions at the new Disneyland park. 6 THE INDEPENDENT FILM JOURNAL— July 9. 195