Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1953)

6 Motion Picture Daily Friday, November 13, 1953 Awarded SEVENTEEN'S Seal as the December Picture of the Month CALAMITY starring £ ' DORIS DAY "1 and Zf HOWARD KEEL and thousands. A Warner Bros. Picture Color by Technicolor seventeen the magazine that sends teens to the movies : MP A to Build 'P.R.' Program in Europe Public relations specialists to promote American-made films in Europe will be hired in France, Germany and Italy, Al Corwin, associate director of public information for the Motion Picture Association of America, said here yesterday on his return from Europe. Corwin, who spent five weeks on the Continent and in Britain to survey the public relations field, said that three specialists would be hired for the aforementioned countries. He added that he will report shortly to Eric Johnston, MPAA president. French Accord {Continued from page 1) status of negotiations besides an expression of optimism that in the course of time, a pact will be sealed with France. He declined comment on the situation in Spain, but it was learned that Griffith Johnson, MPAA economist, has left Paris for Madrid to open negotiations there with Spanish government officials. Johnston, queried on the German film situation, said there is nothing to worry about at this time for that market, adding that the current German film agreement still has a year to run. Johnston, in a further query on France, said that the old FrancoAmerican agreement is being extended pending a new pact. The MPA president is expected to detail the status of French negotiations at a meeting this morning of the Motion Picture Export Association. Following the meeting, Johnson is due to leave for Washington where he will report to President Eisenhower and the State Department on his .Near East mission, which took up most of his four-week stay abroad. A spokesman for Johnston said that the government mission is not expected to take him abroad again until after the first of the year. Many Details Revised Meanwhile, details of the new Dutch film agreement, under which the rules of the quasi-governmental Bioscoopbond have been changed, were disclosed. The principal changes call for the free negotiation of all 3-D, panoramic or similar films and an undetermined number of exceptional pictures of individual companies to be negotiated freely with the Bioscoopbond and the maximum rental on these films to be 40 per cent. Other new regulations, which pertain to all foreign product, including the U. S., provide that conventional films are eligible for rental on a sliding scale from 22y2 to 40 per cent, in comparison to 17^4 to 32J-2 per cent under the old regulations. Another provision defines the film terms on those pictures sold on a straight percentage basis, limiting the number of those eligible in that category to a 35 per cent film rental to 50 per cent of the total. House Probe Nov. 23 HOLLYWOOD, Nov. 12.— The House Un-American Activities Committee will hold closed hearings here Nov. 23-24, with the sub-committee conducting, and with a certain number of film people, as well as others, being called for testimony. Monogram's Name Now Allied Artists; Quarter Net $98,990 HOLLYWOOD, Nov. 12.— Monogram Pictures Corp. became Allied Artists Pictures Corp. officially today when stockholders representing more than 60 per cent of the outstanding shares voted the name change and also approved the directors' recommendation that articles of incorporation be amended to permit increasing the number of dollar-par-value shares from 1,000,000 to 1,500,000. The stockholders re-elected the entire board of directors. Steve Broidy, president, disclosed that operations of the company and its wholly-owned subsidiaries for the first quarter of the present fiscal year, which ended Sept. 26, resulted in a profit of $224,990 before Federal income taxes. This compares with $125,897 for the corresponding period of last year. Net profit after taxes amounted to $98,990, which compares with $68,897 a year ago. 'Cease Fire' Script (Continued from page 1) 'damn' in three places in 'Cease Fire' could be objectionable to no one. Therefore, we appealed the decision of the Breen office to the board in New York. In view of their adverse decision and of our contract with Paramount that requires that we deliver a picture with a seal, we have no alternative but to abide by the board's ruling." Original plans for opening the picture at the Criterion Theatre in New York, said Wallis, remain unchanged. The Production Code Administration's refusal of a seal for "Cease Fire," a Hal Wallis production for Paramount release, was upheld on appeal to the board of directors of the Motion Picture Association of America at a meeting here yesterday. Following a screening of the picture at Paramount's home office projection room for company presidents and their representatives, it was held that the ruling of the PCA should not be reversed. At issue, were a number of sequences in which dialogue, held to be "profane" by the PCA, was used. The appeal to the board was presented by Russell Holman, while Gordon White, director of MPAA's advertising code administration, presented PCA's position. Columbia Set for 5-Day Sales Meet Columbia Pictures' home office executives and top assistants, headed by general sales manager A. Montague, will leave for Chicago today to join field sales personnel from the Midwest and South at the Drake Hotel Sunday for the first of three regional sales meetings. The meeting will last through Thursday. The conclave will make an analysis of current and expected business conditions, with special attention to problems peculiar to the period of changes in exhibition methods. Subsequent sessions will be concerned with the continuing release of Columbia's "From Here to Eternity" and to "Miss Sadie Thompson," "The Caine Mutiny" and "It Should Happen to You."