Motion Picture News (Apr - Jun 1914)

When You See It In ""^The News'''' It's NEWS The MOTION PICTURE NEWS The Fastest ^^^^ Growing Picture Journal ''The Exhibitor's Medium of Communication with His Fellow Showman' Volume IX June 20, 1914 Number 24 LAUNCH NATIONAL BOARD OF TRADE CAMPAIGN AT CONVENTION Project for Trade Org:anization Embracing All Departments of the Business Set Forth at Thursday's Session at Grand Central Palace— National Board of Censorship Endorsed Deles:ates Protest Against Multiple Reels from Regular Program Producers PRELIMINARIES to the equable adjustment of conditions under which exhibitors labor mark the activities of delegates present this week at the convention in New York City of the International Motion Picture Association. A uniform schedule of rental prices, a resolution calling upon American exhibitors to support the National Board of Censorship in its campaign against state regulation of films, tentative opposition to manufacturers who have entered the exhibiting field, and general tirades against the faults of exchanges, constituted the important matters brought before the convention the first three days of the week. More vital to exhibitors even than any of the topics of the convention is a fact of international importance brought clearly into view with the business of the New York assemblage less than one-half completed. A way has been opened, and a path made clear for a National Board of Trade. Whether the New York convention will be able to accomplish it remains to be seen. But the topics under discussion on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, demonstrate the urgent need for an organization of sufficient scope and jurisdiction to act as arbitrators in the settlement of the many unsatisfactory relations now existing between exhibitors, exchangemen and manufacturers. AND this National Board of Trade will, first of all, benefit the exhibitor. This convention is doing its mightiest to accomplish a worthy purpose. But its delegates are men with businesses, beset with personal interests too great to permit a division of their time. A need for trade organization specialists has been manifested, men of experience in trade cooperation. Whether this need will materialize remains for the convention to decide. Despite the efforts made to maintain a smooth-running, business-discussing convention, there were many loopholes. There were times during the several sessions when the convention was in disorder. Parliamentary proceedings were lacking in many respects. Urgent need of a constitution and by-laws under which to conduct the various discussions and arguments was apparent on several occasions. These faults, while they did not detract to a great extent from the accomplishments of the sessions, would, if eliminated, have resulted in a greater degree of harmonious action. But to the men who fostered and promoted the convention, is due a measure of credit they will probably never receive. Nerve, sheer and forceful, initiative pioneer in character, and a faith in their beliefs steadfast in the face of ridicule and scorn, combined to produce an exhibitors' convention — the forerunner of that which promises to elevate the motion-picture business to a plane of solid commercialism, free from the haphazard methods, questionable actions, lax systems and deleterious internal strifes that have characterized the first few years of its existence. They plunged, boldly and determinedl)-, into a thing unattempted and beyond the mental grasp of others with greater power and experience. And when they emerge, with the closing of the convention on Saturday, the business associations of the men who manufacture, rent and market motion pictures will bear a new and more intimate and lasting relation one with the other. WHETHER the convention accomplishes all of the minor ambitions placed before it, to it, and the men who organized it, will belong the privilege of having demonstrated, by their own handicaps, the great financial, commercial and constructive value of a National Board of Trade embracing representatives of every branch of the industry. They have shown, with results thus far accomplished despite a lack of breadth of vision in trade organization, and a deep and intimate knowledge of the technique of commercial cooperation, the great and wonderful opportunities presented to a National Board of Trade, conducted by men of determined integrity, ability, originality and possessed of a thorough understanding of trade arbitration. And out of this convention, unique in its discrepancies when viewed in the light of the future, will be born a National Board of Trade, to which every exhibitor, exchangeman, manufacturer and allied individual may turn for the prompt, impartial and just disposition of questions involving and affecting their interests, to the satisfaction and contentment of all concerned. x\nd when this achievement is made, and then only, will the motion-picture industry be ranked as a business of solidity, safety and universal prosperity. THE Thursday afternoon session of the convention was given over to the discussion of this all-important question — the formation of a national trade organization.