Motion Picture News (Sept-Oct 1916)

2002 MOTION PICTURE NEWS Vol. 14. No. 15 I HAS THE gUALlTY CIRCULATION OF THE TRADE| MOTION PICTURE NEWS EXHIBITORS' TIMES Published on Tuesday Every Week by 729 SEVENTH AVENUE, COR. 49TH STREET, NEW YORK. WILLIAM A. JOHNSTON. President and Editor HENRY F. SEWALL Vice-President E. KENDALL GILLETT Secretary H. ASHTON WYCKOFF Treasurer and Business Manager WENTWORTH TUCKER Asst. Treasurer R. M. VANDIVERT Advertising Manager THEODORE S. MEAD Chicago Manager J. C. JESSEN Los Angeles Manager LESLEY MASON Manaying Editor WILLIAM RESSMAN ANDREWS News Editor The office of the company is the address of the officers. Entered as Second-Class matter at the New York Post Office. Subscription $2 per year, postpaid, in the United States, Mexico, Hawaii, Porto Rico and the Philippine Islands. Canada, $3; Foreign, .$4 per year. N. B. — No agent is authorized to take subscriptions for Motion PiCturk Nkws at less than these rates. Have the agent taking your subscription show his credentials and coupon book. VOL. XIV September 30, 1916 No. 13 Bully for the Neivspapers! OEVERAL newspapers throughout Michigan have taken *^ of¥ense at the caption, " No Children Allowed," or " No Children Admitted," in connection with the showing of certain films. It is the contention of the publishers that these captions are not used because of the fact that the pictures are unfit for children as much as it is to arouse curiosity among the older folks. Several times recently pictures bearing these captions have been refused any newspaper reading matter and publishers have refused to accept advertising. * * * NE paper explains itself in the following editorial : " Whenever you see the sign ' Children Not Admitted ' over a theatre door, you are supposed to know instinctively that something which will shock the modesty is being exhibited there. " Most of our theatre managers appear to be plain boobs. History proves that the American people are clean, that they will not for long pay to see indecent dramas or indecent pictures. If the managers were not boobs, they would not attempt to show the indecent picture. " For the honor of your own women, avoid those theatres that use the indecent, the filthy, the shameless and the red light district as a lure. Life is pleasant, men and women are good. " Why drop into the gutter with the gutter snipes of the moving picture world when you can dwell on the heights with the good and the beautiful ? " * * * 'X'HIS is timely and valuable advice. The " No Children ^ Admitted " sign should be used as rarely as a declaration of martial law, in other words, onl}' when there is the strongest and most unmistakable provocation for so doing. And the attitude of the newspapers who have refused advertising for such pictures should be most emphatically endorsed by every self-respecting exhibitor. * * * ""PHE maker of indecent pictures, and the exhibitor of them will both find that, in the long run, they are playing a.losing game. And it may also be said that the exhibitor who tries to make a picture suggestive or salacious by his advertising of it will sooner or later find that he has injured his own box-office and cut in two hisreceipts. * * * YY/E have " get-rich-quick " men in the ranks of the ex" hibitors, precisely as we have them in Wall Street. Such exhibitors always play for quick money and easy money, and to their mind, it is the sensational, the " border-line " picture that brings it. So it does — for a time. But when the reaction sets in — and it always sets in — the house that dealt habitually in the lurid, ultra-frank picture might just as well be quarantined by the Board of Health ; the townsfolk will not avoid it any more completely. * * * T T is perfectly true that you can get a bigger crowd to see a fire than to watch a sunset. And there are actually exhibitors who prefer to set their theatres on fire, in every sense but the literal one, with inflammatory pictures, to the more reliable, steadier (though slower) attraction of the substantial, well-built story that will bear recollection and bear re-exhibition. * * * IF there were no other reason than that every suggestive picture is an official invitation to censorship, that would be enough to keep even,' clear-headed, sound-minded exhibitor from permitting one to appear on his screen. There is, fortunately, the more fundamental reason of self-preservation, business self-preservation, to teach the exhibitor how to choose between quick, uncertain money, and slower but, in the long run, surer money, and more of it. That reason is that the exhibition of indecent pictures is managerial suicide, simply because the vast majority of the American people do not care to see and will not deliberately go to see such pictures. Make Your Lobby Pack Your House VTT'ITH this issue we introduce to the exhibitor the remarkable lobby displays of Mr. Kashin. A descriptive and illustrated article appears under the department heading: " Live Wire Exhibitors." Further articles, illustrating and describing in detail Kashin lobby displays of pictures in several services will appear hereafter and exclusively in Motion Picture News. * * * "W/ E unhesitatingly pronounce these displays the best picture theatre advertising that has come to our attention and we have searched diligently for just this sort of service for our readers. We believe that these displays are applicable to most any theatre and are within the means of most any exhibitor and then consistently and intelligently used they will turn most any losing house into a successful one. This is a large but, we believe, a logical claim, as our readers will find who follow and apply the ideas set forth in this very interesting and valuable series.