Ink-Stained Hollywood: The Triumph of American Cinema's Trade Press (2022)

REMAKING FILM JOURNALISM IN THE MID-19108 29 A second key industry change in the mid-i910s—and very much related to the MPPC’s waning power—was the rise of the feature film.’ The number of feature films in the American marketplace skyrocketed in the 1910s, from only eight in 1912 to an estimated 835 in 1916.'' The producers and distributors of these films utilized a business strategy of product differentiation; they distinguished their films from the films of competitors based on screen stories, production values, and, especially, the casting of stars. Some of the MPPC manufacturers produced feature films, but their distributor, the GFC, was poorly equipped for the exploitation of features. The GFC rented films to exhibitors for single days and charged them ona per-foot-of-film basis. Many exhibitors liked the price stability and daily program changes. But the Independent manufacturers and their distributors, especially Paramount, found exhibitors willing to accept a different model—longer runs and pricing based on a film's quality or star power, not a flat per-foot basis. Independent manufacturers could invest more in feature productions because their distribution and rental model enabled them to profit more from a successful film.” The film industry trade papers were beneficiaries of the feature’s rise. The growth in feature films closely correlates with the swelling of Moving Picture World’s and Motion Picture News pages in the mid-1910s (see fig. 8). The trade papers offered a way for feature distributors to differentiate their products and promote them to exhibitors. A colorful two-page advertisement, a positive review, and an exciting news story about the making of the film could help craft the perception that a feature film was, indeed, something special. Even if an exhibitor had already signed on to a feature program—thus becoming contractually obligated to accept a whole slate of films—distributors knew that if exhibitors believed in a movie, they promoted it more to their clientele, resulting in a larger box-office gross.'’ The production of short films in 1916 also remained strong: 4,115 shorts, which required some promotion to exhibitors.'* The coexistence of features and shorts was a boon to the trade papers’ advertising departments. Much like the late-1920s transition to sound—in which distributors simultaneously promoted silent and sound films to exhibitors—the rise of the feature and continued production of shorts effectively created two marketplaces for film buying. The trade papers most effective at connecting buyers to sellers stood to gain handsomely in this environment. The rise of the feature film also encouraged the theatrical trade papers to devote more coverage to film. Billboard and New York Dramatic Mirror were the leaders in this respect. Both papers established film sections in 1908, and these sections more than doubled in size from 1912 to 1916. The best-remembered theatrical paper to cover film, Variety, lagged in comparison. As a data visualization of Variety's shifting content coverage illustrates, the publication actually decreased its attention to film in 1910 and 1912 compared to 1908 (see fig. 1). It was not until the rise of the multireel feature film in 1913 and 1914 that Variety established a film news and reviews section and increased its film coverage again. Variety was the indisputable king of vaudeville papers in the 1910s, but it did not really become a leading