Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1959)

FOR THOSE WHO DEMAND THE FINEST in Motion Picture Daily Tuesday, November 24, 195^ BLACK WHITE Complete BLACK & WHITE 16-35 mm film processing. Complete EASTMAN COLOR 16 35 mm negative — positive processing. COLOR FILM STRIP PRINTING & DEVELOPING. KODACHROME ADDITIVE scene to scene printing. EKTACHROME developing. in the East it's... Foreign Films — Fact and Fancy (Continued from preceding page) that matter, was the enormous hit scored by the British "Private Life of Henry VIII" based on the good King's matrimonial misadventures. Incidentally, it had its American premiere at the Radio City Music Hall, which has still to show any of our current crop of foreign films. The widespread distribution of European pictures in the U. S. collapsed with the coming of sound. It did not revive until immediately subsequent to the War when Joseph Burstyn and I imported "Open City," and two years later, "Paisan." Both of these masterpieces grossed close to a million dollars, approximately the equivalent of two million dollars in today's market, grossed it, I might add parenthetically, without 32 exchanges, 400 prints, or prurient colored foldup ads in national weeklies. Both pictures had some sexual connotations, but compared to such Code-approved Hollywood productions as "The Summer Place" or "The Best of Everything," they were the acme of propriety. Indeed, the present campaign to make it appear that complaints concerning the salacious content of films is primarily due to the salaciousness of foreign imports is as far-fetched as it is phony. Product Shortage Left Vacuum It must be granted, however, that the present revived interest in foreign films is probably due less to their boxoffice or artistic merits than to the decline in Hollywood production. Theatre owners, regardless of their own taste or that of their patrons, have had no recourse except to book foreign pictures occasionally if they wanted to keep their doors open. Approximately 650 houses play foreign pictures more or less regularly. This pitifully small segment of the total number of theatres in the U. S. constitutes the famous "art houses" about which so much balderdash has been written. Few of them care to play the pick of the foreign market, greatly preferring sexy films, if available. Few of them are highly profitable and few of them would not play choice American features if they could consistently obtain them. The commercial distribution of foreign films has also benefited from substantial improvements in the process of dubbing. It is still an insult in most cases both to the eye and to the ear, but it is now accepted without too much disapprobation by audiences which formerly greeted it with raucous laughter. Motion picture statistics are notoriously unreliable, but 585 foreign films were probably released in the U. S. in 1958. The rentals paid for them are reported to have amounted to a little less than fifteen million dollars, but at least five million of this was grossed by a handful of sensational Bardot films. Taking this into consideration, the average foreign film release netted for its importer approximately $17,000. It should be borne in mind, however, that close to 50% of the imports were Mexican and Chinese films shown only in insignificant foreign language houses. Even eliminating these, it is doubtful, however, if more than a very limited number of English and European films grossed over $25,000, which is scarcely enough to repay their original investment plus their distribution costs. Imports of "Inestimable Value''9 The importance of foreign films on the American scene and American screen should not, however, be underestimated. It cannot be measured in terms of boxoffice return or distributors' profit. Over the years these pictures have been of inestimable value in stimulating and fertilizing the minds and the methods of American picture directors, writers and producers. At the same time they have encouraged the receptivity of a small but influential segment of American audiences to new themes, new techniques and new points of view. What Eisenstein, Rene Clair, Lubitsch, Rossellini and a host of other foreign directors accomplished in the past is now being achieved by such men as Ingmar Bergman and Satyhayajit Ray. Moreover, there are a score of immensely talented young directors in the wings ready to take over leadership in the near future. It is a safe prophecy that no one is going to get very rich importing foreign films. But there are other rewards as valuable as the financial — the rewards that arise from serving the film industry, the nation and the cause of worldwide understanding. Congratulation s to M IDLER from Bill Goldberg Max A. Goldberg Distributors of "TEMPEST IN THE FLESH" PACEMAKER PICTURES, INC. 1790 Broadway New York 19, New York Plaza 7-5363 Congratulations BEN ABLER (Soon to be released) "Angry Island" IN COLOR and CINEMASCOPE BENTLEY FILMS INC. 37 WEST 57th ST., NEW YORK 19, N.Y. GEORGE ROTH PLaza 5-6845 M0VIELAB BUILDING 619 W. 54th ST., NEW YORK 19, N. Y. JUdson 6-0367