Minutes of evidence taken before the Departmental Committee on Cinematograph Films (1936)

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE 83 26 May, 1936.] Mr. T. H. Fligelstone and Mr. W. R. Fuller. [I 'untin ued. good first and varying second feature. That is films above the inferior class? — 114 that are usable. 652. You say the industrial cinema needs a maximum of 40, and taking the average it would seem they have a choice of one in three? — No, because there are three, four, five and six cinemas in each district competing for the films. 653. It really is chiefly a problem in these populous districts where people can reach several cinemas. Is there a big over-production of cinema houses at present, too many cinemas? — Far too many, my Lord. 654. You are anxiously considering the matter? — There are far too many, my Lord, and so long as the public are foolish enough to supply the wherewithal for these speculators the building will go on. 655. On the average there is a choice of one in three? — No, my Lord. 1 must make this point very clear. You see in those districts where there is the choice of one in three, that is in districts where there is only one cinema, you find that the cinemas are using a far greater proportion of British films than they do in the populous districts. In the populous districts where you have five cinemastake Walthamstow, for example, where we have five cinemas. We do not run the same film. Each of those five cinemas runs five different programmes, and so the 114 per annum is divided between the five cinemas. 656. I see. If all bad quality films were jjood would not that meet the difficulty? — It would help considerably, my Lord, especially if the quota is reduced, as we suggest, to 10 per cent. 657. That is a useful road to explore, whether something effective could be done. It is rather difficult to fixl a figure in the abstract. The question is whether we can improve the supply, in which case the figure might be adjusted accordingly?— But we must not lose sight of one great point, and that is the one you raised a moment ago. There are districts in this country which are resentful of British films, and it is a very great burden — despite whatever choice there might be in British films — upon the exhibitor in those districts that he should have to show, for 20 per cent, of his year's programme, product that his public do not like. We are all prepared to be patriotic, but you must not drive us too hard. 658. Is it due to block booking? You say the best films are taken by circuits? — That is so. 659. If block booking be broken down, and if the renter could not force bad films upon a reluctant exhibitor ? — That would be the millennium. 660. Why can you not deal with it in the way you deal with blind booking? Why can you not make it an offence to make it a condition that one film shall not be given to an exhibitor unless he takes another? — We should like that very much, but it does not seem practical in the ordinary way of business. 661. I wish you would develop that answer. You are familiar with the difficulties and we are not. Why coidd not that be enforced? — The question of block booking, as you have it here, is not exactly as I believe is understood. Block booking in the past, i.e., prior to the 1927 Act, meant a combination of blind and block booking. 662. Yes? — And that meant each year we Mould be offered a string of titles and book a block, ten. twelve or fifteen films, as the case may be. Th.it does not happen to-day. The film is shown and then booked in a block, and what the renter does is to offer you seven or eight films, and out of the seven or eight perhaps you would like to take five or four. But the renter is not prepared to book you the five or four unless you are prepared to take the eight, and then it becomes a matt"!' of negotiation. 663. I see you benefit to some extent by stopping blind hooking? — Not to some extent, my Lord, but to a great extent. 664. If you could stop block booking as well, you would be very much better off? — Well, that is. of course, covered by the suggestion we placed before you in paragraph 30, the K.R.S. booking policy. 665. Well, you describe the difficulty, but T do not gather that any solution has been given? — The soluin view is this. It is a question of the strength or weakness of the two parties negotiating. The individual exhibitor has not got the same chance of putting up a fight in negotiation as a circuit or if he has a number of situations to book for. If I am an independent exhibitor and say to the renter : " No, I am not prepared to book these eight films to get three or four good ones," then the renter might say: " This is only one situation," and leave it at that — but if I represent a circuit or a group of cinemas the position is very different as you will readily appreciate, and that is why the circuit does not have to take the same number of bad films as the independent exhibitor. 666. It is interesting, with regard to the recommendation in paragraph 23 that the quota should be reduced, to notice that the proportion of British films shown is considerably above the quota, which does not look as if on the average there is any insuperable difficulty about complying with it. It is rather difficult to understand why you suggest reduction to 10 per cent, if at the present time, in spite of its only being 20 per cent., 25-5 per cent, is being shown? — That is a point I have to clear up. 667. That it is a matter of taste in different districts?— Not only that. It is not a matter of the average, for this reason. In those solo districts where there is no competition and where there is a liking for British films, as you can obtain from the figures at the Board of Trade as much as 45 to 50. and even over that percentage of British film is used. But in the populous districts where there are these five to six cinemas competing for film the average is very much less. 668. In paragraph 26 you suggest that you would like to come back to us if we reach any decision as to the scale of renters' quota? — Yes. 669. I must point out the difficulty about that, because it is unusual for Committees to reach any decision as to their recommendations until they have heard the evidence, and I have not the slightest idea what will develop. Once we have reached our opinion, of course, we naturally have to report to the authority that appointed us, and we cannot begin recalling people when we have come to the end of our evidence. I hope you will understand it is not from any discourtesy, but from a necessity of the case that we must ask witnesses to state the case to the full when they come to us, and we have to form our opinions on that? — We have put that in so that we might not appear discourteous if, after you have arrived at your decisions on grounds which we do not think are advantageous or fair to the industry, we find that we must proceed further in this matter. 670. Then the responsibility is on the Board of Trade?— Yes. 671. They clearly have to examine it over again. But I am afraid we cannot look on any evidence as conditional on a particular decision ?— No, we quite appreciate that. 672. I wanted to make that clear? — If I might suggest, this is my own personal opinion and nut the opinion of the Association. 673. We quite appreciate we may consult you again if wTe think there is anything which makes it necessary. You put the cost of a good film a good deal higher than some other authorities. You put it at £25,000 to £30,000 at least. Any high figure would have the unfortunate effect of knocking out the small producers, but a lower figure which would yet be much beyond what they are spending at the present time would not have this effeci of knocking out small film producers. You do not want to kei p the " quickie " producer, even though he is small? — 36152 L 2