Motion Picture Herald (Jan-Mar 1954)

iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimiiimiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii by WILLIAM R. WEAVER Hollywood Editor ON ACCOUNT of an eligibility rule imposed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, to the effect that a picture must have been exhibited publicly and under paid-admittance conditions within the corporate limits of Los Angeles and within the calendar year if it is to be considered a candidate for Academy Award-ing, it is a local custom for producers to press for bookings of their proudest works around this time of year. Some years this has worked out somewhat sadly for local exhibitors, and their customers, when the art-y section — producers, writers, directors too — has been having its way so undisputedly that the local scene has wound up the year with a wide variety of artistic achievements on display before a happily un-artistic multitude of plain people looking for a good movie instead. Holidays were dull days here in those years. Situation This Year Is Very Different But this year is different. The arty-y section has been in the dog house this past twelvemonth — two twelvemonths, for that matter — and everybody’s been making pictures conceived, designed and executed for the plain purpose of entertaining people and making money. So this year the proudest works of the producers who, with undiminished vim, have pressed for holiday bookings, are not only very proud works indeed, but very profitable works also. And this year, happily for both the un-artistic and the artistic customers, and ditto exhibitors, the business (over the first long weekend, this is) has beaten every year’s since early postwar. Here is some of the product, not all of it pointed at Academy consideration, on which the population hereabouts feasted and, in most cases, is feasting still : ‘‘Knights of the Round Table,” MGM’s first production in CinemaScope, is making Hollywood Boulevard history at the historic, but muchly modernized, Egyptian theatre ; List Others That Are Prospering A short walk up the street, at the Chinese, and also at the Los Angeles in the downtown area, Twentieth-Century-Fox’s “Beneath the 12-Mile Reef” is prospering handsomely ; In midtown the Fox Wilshire likewise is coining money with another film in CinemaScope, the long-running “How to Marry a Millionaire,” with no end of a run in sight; On the 3-D front the Wayne-Fellows production of “Hondo,” a Warner release, has the turnstiles spinning at the two Paramounts, the Hollywood and the downtown bearers of the name, and a new chapter is being written into the book of “Whither— and Whether — 3-D Now?” Other chapters are being inscribed by “Kiss Me Kate” and “Miss Sadie Thompson,” each of which is playing in two theatres, and doing very nicely, thank you. Other Features Also Doing Lusty Business Other features doing a thriving business are “Julius Caesar,” which perhaps could be described as more artistic than commercial if it were not for that baker’s dozen of marquee names in the cast ; “The Living Desert,” living its second lusty week at the not outrightly artistic Fine Arts, “Act of Love,” another single booking, and "Here Come the Girls,” playing upwards of a dozen theatres on its second local round. That’s the way the holiday product on display here is averaging out. Which is not to say, of course, that any of these pictures are of necessity going to win any Academy Awards. On the contrary, a good many of the year’s most challenging attractions were given their Los Angeles runs a good while back, as the calendar flies. Some of those which have been highly regarded by the professionals who do the Academy voting, and by the non-professionals who cast their votes in coin of the realm in exchange for admittance tickets, are : “Shane,” the George Stevens production for Paramount which, in many opinions, told the whole story of the West as fully as it need ever be told; “War of the Worlds,” the brilliant George Pal materialization of H. G. Wells’ everfresh account of inter-stellar conquest ; “ Queen Is Crowned” Popular Documentary “The Robe,” the 20th-Fox picturization of Lloyd C. Douglas’ tremendous book for introduction of the company’s tremendous CinemaScope process ; “A Queen Is Crowned,” easily the most popular documentary (or newsfilm) ever released ; “Lili,” to many the most delightful experience in a rich season ; “From Here to Eternity,” the box office record-breaker ; and — Your favorite picture, whatever it may be. The list of titles submitted to the members of the Academy at voting time — with no purpose save to notify that the pictures on this list qualify for voting so far as the fact of their having been exhibited properly within the prescribed time and territory is concerned — usually runs between 300 and THIS WEEK IN PRODUCTION: COMPLETED (3) INDEPENDENT Tender Hearts (Haas) SHOOTING (15) MGM Prisoner of War Story (Ansco Color) Brigadoon (CinemaScope; Ansco Color) Student Prince (CinemaScope; Ansco Color) Bride for Seven Brothers (CinemaScope; Eastman Color) PARAMOUNT Conquest of Space (Technicolor) Rear Window (Technicolor) RKO Big Rainbow (Technicolor) U-l Black Shield of Falworth REPUBLIC Hot Heiress Shanghai Story (CinemaScope; Technicolor) Sign of the Pagan (CinemaScope; Technicolor) Playgirl WARNER Talisman (Cin emaScope; WarnerColor) Ring of Fear (WayneFellows; CinemaScope; WarnerColor) Lucky Me (CinemaScope; WarnerColor) Star Is Born (CinemaScope; WarnerColor) High and Mighty (Wayne Fellows: CinemaScope; WarnerColor) iiiiiiiiiimiiimiiiiiiiiiiiimimiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii 400. This year it will run nearer the former figure than the latter. But the Academy member’s voting will be a complicated procedure this time, for two principal reasons. First, the year has witnessed release of more high-quality pictures than last year. Second, they weren’t all alike, dimensionally, and in some degree that has to mean they were not all strictly comparable objects. Up to this late hour in an expiring year the Academy has not divided up the pictures as to dimensions, in the way it divides them into “color” and “black and white” for the purposes of awardings in several divisions — photograph, art direction, etc. — and there has been no public discussion of doing so. Yet it is quite as difficult to say with finality that a certain picture in 3-D is better than another in CinemaScope, for instance, as it is to argue that a cinematographer who shot his picture in Technicolor, for another instance, did a better job than one who shot his picture in black and white. A Big Problem Faces Academy Now the Academy, in its 25 illustrious years of earnest endeavor and complete dedication to the advancement of the motion picture art and science, has run the count of its regular awards up to the neighborhood of 30 or so. And if it elects to split up the 1953 product along dimensional lines it will need to double, perhaps treble, that number. This is a frightening prospect, and hedged around with more thorns than meets the casual eye. But it is also a big and proper problem — big and proper enough to engage the Academy Board of Governors very earnestly for a good way into the Happy New Year. 24 MOTION PICTURE HERALD, JANUARY 2, 1954