The Exhibitor (1966)

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.

AlP Enters "Grand Stale Phase"; $16 Million Budgeted For 11 Films NEW YORK — American International en¬ ters the grand scale phase of company develop¬ ment with a $16 million outlay for nine pro¬ ductions, three of which are in the $3 million class adapted from pre-sold sources, AI heads James H. Nicholson and Samuel Z. Arkoff announced. The new phase is marked by an all-out effort to obtain top literary and stage proper¬ ties for films while continuing the company’s past leadership in the action, teen-interest, horror, and family type categories of filmmaking, Nicholson said. “We are negotiating to obtain the services of top name talents and top directors for this new phase of our development which will defi¬ nitely be on the grand scale of production so successful with pre-sold books and plays,” the president declared. The $16 million nine picture budget exceeds the company’s total production outlay during its first three years of operation. First of the $3 million productions will be the Jules Verne science fiction classic, “Rocket to the Moon,” scheduled to start location shooting in Ireland in August with an allstar cast that includes Terry-Thomas, Gert Probe, and Lionel Jeffries. Others in the multi-million dollar class, now in final stages of negotiation, are screen adapta¬ tions of a major Broadway classic musical, and an ultra-spectacular musical comedy — one of which will be made in Europe and the other in Hollywood. Four of ATs additional million dollar fea¬ tures, each budgeted at $1 million or more and starting in July, will be made in Hollywood while three will be made overseas as co-pro¬ ductions, Nicholson said. A record 1 1 features already “in the can” for AI release are of every category of film making, a number filmed in round-the-world locations. “Significant in the highly diversified nature of our 17 picture schedule for the remainder of this year and part of 1967 is the fact that HARTFORD — “The Dirty Girls,” a motion picture “you’ve never seen anything like . . .,” has been held to be obscene, lascivious, in¬ decent, and immoral by the Appellate Division of the Connecticut Circuit Court here in an opinion upholding the obscenity conviction of Baruch S. LeWitt, manager of the suburban Berlin Drive-In. LeWitt was convicted last November by a New Britain, Conn., Circuit Court judge, fined $850 and sentenced to 10 days in jail. He claimed the proof of guilt was not beyond reasonable doubt. LeWitt’s attorney, Edwin A. Passman, said it is likely an appeal will be made to the State Supreme Court. “The Dirty Girls” was the drive-in theatre's feature attraction several evenings last July. in the aggregate they make up a highly com¬ mercial package and yet maintain in content all the ingredients of entertainment chemistry which have been the company hallmark in the past,” Nicholson pointed out. “Our million dollar budgets reflect only production values that will be seen on the screen and not excessive overhead or over¬ paid actors,” he added. “It is a realistic lineup wherein one feature will not be overlooked because of the inflated cost of another. More¬ over, our release pattern is such that each feature will be adequately merchandised to get maximum public attention for theatre runs and any subsequent exposure.” First on the list of Hollywood-based produc¬ tions, with a $1,400,000 budget is the NASCAR auto racing thriller, “Malibu 500,” starting in July. It will be followerd by a $1,250,000 as-yet-untitled “high camp hill-billy comedy” to start here in September, and the $1 million horror suspense mystery, “It,” shooting simul¬ taneously. The fourth Hollywood production will be “Girl in the Glass Castle,” a milliondollar musical comedy scheduled to shoot in November. The other two big overseas co-productions are the $1,350,000 H. G. Wells classic “2067 A.D. — When the Sleeper Wakes,” a science fiction spectacular to be made in Lon¬ don, and the million-dollar remake of the alltime horror classic, “The Golem,” to be filmed in November in Europe. American International’s executive vicepresident Samuel Z. Arkoff is currently in Europe finalizing the co-productions and super¬ vising final shooting on the sci-fi, “Dr. Goldfoot and the Love Bombs,” Nicholson said. Included in the 1 1 AI releases “in the can” are “Fireball 500,” “All the Wild Angels,” “La Dolce Vita,” “Bang, You’re Dead,” “Tokyo Olympiad,” “Tarzan and the Valley of Gold,” “War — Italian Style,” “Trunk to Cairo,” “Violent Journey,” “Frankenstein Con¬ quers the World,” and ‘The Man from Cocody.” It is alternately titled “The D-Girls.” A de¬ tachment of State Police troopers viewed the last scheduled showing and afterwards arrested LeWitt. State Police Major Carroll E. Shaw said it was “the most obscene” motion picture he had ever seen. The original charge was risk of injury to a minor. It was changed to indecent or immoral exhibition. The Appeals judges used the U.S. Supreme Court definition of obscenity as being “utterly without redeeming social importance” to brand “The Dirty Girls.” In a concluding paragraph, the Appeals judges found the film “had no scientific or artistic purpose or justification and centers predominantly upon what is sexually perverse and bizarre.” Nemec Joins Inflight As Director Of Research NEW YORK — Boyce Nemac has joined In¬ flight Motion Pictures, Inc., as director of research and development, it was announced by David Flexer, president. Nemac, who is known as one of the leading engineering and standards specialists in the motion picture industry, was associated with the development of the first airborne projector which Inflight put into regular commercial service on Trans World Airlines in 1961. He has stayed abreast of the over 70 technical improvements which have been incorporated into all 500 projectors by Inflight’s engineering group in the five years since. As director of research and development for Inflight, Nemac is supervising the newly created projection illumination system, called the Hi-Lite (HL) 400, which Inflight will in¬ augurate this month. The HL-400, a develop¬ ment which represents an Inflight investnient of over a million dollars, was created with the cooperation of the General Electric Com¬ pany. It delivers four times the illumination of previous light sources. The HL-400 is a new arc light, coupled with special power sup¬ plies, light collecting and reflecting devices, and new, complex optics to permit the showing of movies on the wide screen, in full color, even in full sunlight, without the necessity for drawing any of the window shades. All Inflight projectors on TWA, United Air Lines, Philippine Air Lines, Air France, and Olympic Airways will be equipped with the new HL-400 this spring. Nemac is a Fellow of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers and served as executive secretary of the Society for 1 1 years. He was also secretary of the interna¬ tional standards committee on motion pictures and was most recently president of Reevesound Company, Inc. N.Y. Names WOMPI Slate NEW YORK— The New York Chapter o( Women of the Motion Picture Industry elected Eleanor Kilgour, Embassy, president; Marcia Hack, Buena Vista, first vice-president; Jackie Contini, Fabian, second vice-president; Amy Rohde, MGM, corresponding secretary; Betty Hieke, Fabian, recording secretary; and Rosa¬ lind Lieberman, Embassy, treasurer, at their April business meeting. The new officers will be installed at the annual dinner to be held at the Tavern on the Green on June 28. Max Miller, United Artists' mid-eastern regional publicity supervisor, recently introduced Hawaiian beauties Ramona Tong Young and Eno Cole to Richard L. Olanoff, Deputy City Representative, dur¬ ing their visit to Philadelphia on behalf of the forthcoming picturization of James A. Michener's "Hawaii." "Dirty Girls" Declared Obscene; Court Upholds Cxhib's Conviction 10 MOTION PICTURE EXHIBITOR May n, 1966