Motion Picture Herald (May-Jun 1946)

MOTION PICTURE HERALD MARTIN QVIGLEY, EJitor-m-Chief and Publisher TERRY RAMSAYE, Editor Vol. 163, No. 10 ■SlEI Ju'^e 8, 1946 UN and THE NEWSREELS THAT ancient and enduring issue between interest and importance connes up again in a sort of dither of attention to certain remarks of Mr. Benjamin A. Cohen, chief of information for the United Nations, before the Associated Motion Picture Advertisers concerning a lack of an agreeable amount of newsreel coverage of the transactions of the UN meetings up in the Bronx. Indubitably the UN sessions are of large importance. Also they consist of a group of somewhat mature gentlemen sitting around a table talking, day after day. The plain fact is that those meetings constitute such an unexciting show that there has been public complaint in the New York press from officials saying they have not been able to give away seats to the public. There is an assumption, apparently, obviously, that the motion picture industry and its screen should be doing something about everything. That assumption is mostly held by persons who have causes to plead, movements to further, campaigns to make. Those persons are always getting too much attention. Important as the motion picture is, it is still but a medium. It is not a motivator. It can say many things with great effectiveness, but it remains an instrument of saying and showing. The public pays It to say and show the sort of material that it wants to see and hear. Perhaps it would be helpful to consider another expression of public control in the example of the daily press. Compare the space devoted to sports, scandals, society, columnists' bistro chatter, comics and the like with the attention to significant news and reports on matters affecting human destiny. How much of the output of the printing press is dedicated to improvement of the world? Probably less than you would guess, and realize, too, that attentive readership is a decided minority. Along with that, reflect on the fact that the printed word can run down Its customers one by one, while the screen must collect Its patrons in audiences of hundreds or thousands at a time and place. The United Nations proceedings as a show have somewhat the same appeal as the pages of the Congressional Record. Meanwhile, in fairness to Mr. Cohen It may be said his remarks before the AM PA were observations rather than criticism. He is a person of film experience. The heat came out in comment on his comment. ■ ■ ■ GIVEAWAYS, AGAIN MOTION PICTURE exhibition, with its depression year experience with Bank Night, Bingo and free dishes behind it, can regard with puzzled Interest the current inflation period mania for giveaways in the radio field and in all manner of merchandising from cereals to soap. The Premium Advertising Association of America, fifteen hundred strong, convened in Chicago recently and forecast that by 1947 their volume would reach a billion. This year their gimcrack merchandise is in too short supply to make any records, but the forecast is to be compared with the previous high year of 1941, when the wholesale price total reached above $500,000,000. Just now the premium goods makers are having profitable fun, since they have no retail price to be curbed by the Office of Price Administration, which Is, as usual, puzzled. Profits are said to be right handsome and unrestrained. The relaxed public seems to be much in the mood of something for nothing, and hopeful about the prize lotteries. ■ ■ ■ "THEY BEGET TROUBLE" ONCE in a while some positively forthright words are spoken in this diplomatic industry. Out in Hollywood the other day Mr. Samuel Broidy of Monogram gave press audience to remark on the state of the art and invitations to censorship. SOME REMARKS: "No matter how they are dressed up — whether in terms of psychological study or some other way — they all boil down to sex, and they all beget trouble . . . All responsible executives realize now that the films have gone too far . . . you will see a distinct swing toward cleaner pictures. "Advertising, too, has got out of line. Ad writers are using copy and illustration which exaggerates even the material that is in the really bad pictures, and suggesting evil things in the good ones. This is worse , . . than the pictures themselves and will have to be stopped." Remember — that comes from the seat of production. It promises realization of the processes of self-regulation. ■ ■ ■ BOMB-FLECKED FILM RESEARCH finds that the first atomic bomb blast, that demonstration out on the deserts of New Mexico, shot the air of the United States full of radioactivity which came down like rain, resulting In the contamination of papermaking materials including strawboard used In packing photographic films. The radioactivity made fog spots In the emulsion. Eastman Kodak's researchers In Rochester ran the trouble down, and, despite some confused reports, it is said no motion picture film affected left the plant. Meanwhile, against possible alarms about perils ahead. It is to be observed that the metal containers used for motion picture film shield against external impact, just In case the Bikini blast reaches around the world. ■ ■ ■ . THE profound Associated Press has transmitted a report of a new triumph of science: to wit, that Dr. Edward Weiss of Temple University in Philadelphia has diagnosed as "psychogenic rheumatism" a condition of aches and pains, without foundation In organic ailment but because of "nursing a smoldering grudge against someone". We have known about that for a long time, often experiencing the pain, and "psychogenic" Is not the real name for It, either. — Terry Kamsaye