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

Record Details:

Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

140 COMMITTEE ON CINEMATOGRAPH FILMS July, 1936.] Mr. Ivor Montagu. [Con t may be of interest owing not to novelty, but to significance in historical development. They may be of interest owing not to treatment or theme, but to their expression in terms of some foreign, and particularly unfamiliar, culture, on which they may throw light. In whatever category they may fall in respect to their interest, they are suitable for Society study, however, only if, by virtue of their age, experimental character, exotic provenance or otlnr factor, they are rightly or wrongly regarded by the trade as unsuited to popular exhibition and therefore they are not available for viewing in the ordinary cinema. From the characterisation above it is to be noted that, by definition, the " specialised " or " Society " film is particularly often a foreign film. It has happened that a film produced in this country has been of so novel or experimental a character that its exhibition qualities were not appreciated by the trade until subsequent to performance by the Film Society (notably is this the case with a whole class of innovating documentary films such as those produced by the Empire Marketing Board and G.P.O. Film Units), but in general films produced in Britain are rarely so produced without an envisaged or even pre-arranged path of British commercial exhibition. Whereas very frequently, for one reason or another, a foreign film with full possibilities of commercial exploitation in its country of origin, is not of general interest to the public of this country, and could not in this country be at all seen or studied but for other than the normal commercial channels of exhibition. It is with films of the type above described, and the effect upon them of the Cinematograph Films Act, 19^7, that this memorandum proposes to deal. The Societies and the Specialised Halls. 2. During the years since 1925-6 a number of provincial societies, working similarly not for profit, and similarly restricting exhibition to subscribing members and a limited proportion of invited guests, have followed the example of the Film Society. The work of the Film Society has very generally and very generously been recognised by the most varying authorities as wholly beneficial to cinematography in general and to the British industry in particular. It should be noted that the Society has throughout enjoyed the kind and courteous assistance of the trade. Among the ways in which its work has been recognised as beneficial are the following : — (a) The introduction to British production (many studio technicians, directors and producers are among its audiences) of new methods of technique. (b) The introduction to British production of new personalities. (A list of personalities, both British and foreign, who have later, by general consent, contributed to the lustre of British production, and whose work has been first exhibited in England by the Society has been from time to time compiled and need not be here repeated. It is in any case formidable.) (e) The introduction of films to new strata of British intellectual life (a factor which, it has been observed, has on occasion interested new sources of capital in the films generally). (d) The introduction of novel themes and novel methods to audiences, and indirectly, the • consequent expansion of the field of interest of wide audiences. 3. These activities, particularly the last, have prepared for and are. in fact, now supplemented by, the intermediate stage of the small specialised cinematograph hall or theatre. The pioneering work of the Societies has created an interest, in the penalised film among audiences sufficiently large to be catered for by such small theatres, and in turn, the small specialised theatre, by acting as a tesl ground on a rather wider scale for specialised films of at least the less experimental type, serves to carry a stage further the beneficial work of testing of new personalities and techniques on British audiences, and still further expansion among wider audiences of new themes, initiated by the Societies. The work of these theatres is conducted for commercial profit, but that their activity has this useful side has been recognised, for example, by the report " The Film in National Life ", the recommendations of which, it will be recalled, led to the foundation of the British Film Institute. Who can be found to distribute a Spec caused Film ? 4. If the specialised hall wishes to show a foreign film, even if that showing be the only one in England and the film be obtained direct from and returned direct to the owner, there must in the transaction, for the purposes of the Act, be a middleman, a renter or distributor to register it. Who is to act as renter for it? No renter will lightly use up his foreign quota upon a film which, in advance, is expected to book to only one or two theatres. Certain big British producing firms, "it is possible, distribute less than their quota of foreign films in the normal course of their business. These, if willing, could without expending all their available foreign quota, register films for these small theatres. Requests to this effect have in the past been made to some such firms, but rarely if ever been acceded to. It would indeed have been unreasonable to expect otherwise, for such a request is tantamount to asking one commercial concern to trouble itself with a number of formalities out of the usual run of its activity, for no return and. however philanthropic an object, the incidental benefit of another commercial concern. This method is impractical. It is obviously quite impossible for the small specialised theatre exhibitor himself to start a formal renting organisation and produce or acquire the necessary equivalent of British films. The best income possibly to be expected from the exhibition of specialised films is a few hundred pounds, the cost of production of films, even of the not altogether creditable type termed a " quickie ". runs into several thousands. To expect this solution is tantamount to demanding that no public exhibition should take place of specialised films unless the exhibitor were prepared and able to invest many thousands of pounds in production, an obviously impractical limitation. How then do the specialised theatres in general manage to exist? Some (a retrogressive move), by means of a high proportion of revivals. But in general, since without some novelty they could not persist, by persuading distributors with a margin of British quota to register some specialised film that is of such a character that, with luck, it may possibly expect a wider exhibition than in the specialised theatres only, and therefore be worth the distributor's while to register. This means that, of novel films, those tend exclusively to be shown which are least experimental, in other words, experiment, the chief and most to be applauded activity of these specialised theatres, is discouraged. Even so, many would be even more severely handicapped, or even unable to carry on. without the present assistance of the Film Society. The Film Society's Assistance to the Specialised Theatkes. 5. Early subsequent to the passage of Cinematograph Films Act, 1927, it became apparent that, as unforeseen consequence, the specialised theatres would find it impossible to obtain a sufficient supply of films, particularly of experimental type. They applied to the Film Society, which bad until that time been accustomed to assist them with advice ami encouragement . The Film Society conducted conversations with the Hoard of Trade, pointing out that the strict opera