Motion Picture News (Sept-Oct 1918)

i| £ e p t e m b < r 2 8 , 191 8 2007 1 ^anmjniiiLiiiiititiiiMKntniiniiKiii! hii:i!;i i!M r::.tiii:ii!htHi;iiM:nii[nii;ini'iiti!iihitui. 11,1 nniifiMH! ii;];iiii:iii:;iiii:Mi!LiijjMiiitnM:iitiinii:iiniM MiiiiininriiiiiininiiKiiuhii h MiiMiiiiiiiiiiK niiHiiiiiitiiMMiiifiMMnnii [iiMi!iiti!iiiiiiiMiMii!iitiittiiiiiiH<iiiii<tf!!iiiiinniiiniMn finiiiiMiiiiMiiiiniiiiiHiiiMi]^ \ f Small City Man Needs Real Exploitation \ S Recently ice told you hozv A. S. Kolstad has mode his 1 theatre a real institution in Hood River, Oregon. Mr. Kolstad 1 has solved many of the problems that confront the smaller city exhibitor, but in asking him to serve on the Advisory 1 Board tee also asked him 'what he found to be the matter jj with the exploitali m of pictures so far as his community is 1 concerned. This is his answer, and he finds that the new I Complete Plan Book is a great aid to him: I HAVE found many objections to the producers' way of * selling us pictures. In the trade papers one picks out such expressions as "A picture of the rarest beauty, full of I poetic touches, and yet strongly dramatic. A picture to book I and advertise and clean up with." That gives one a great idea of what the play is like, and yet when one receives the press dope on the above play they will know just as much more about it as they did originally, I and yet the producers expect us to sell their product by using I superlatives. For instance, not long ago I ran a dandy little B play with a popular pair of juvenile stars. The name was I different than the original book and on none of the billing B was there any mention of the fact that it was taken from §{ one of the " Stover of Yale " stories. After the first day's run B I got out dodgers ar.d told the public just what the story was J and mopped up on the second day's business. This, of course, g. is an exceptional case, but it only goes to show what we L have to put up with. It seems that the principal asset of most of the ad writers B is a bunch of superlatives in a mixed up mass which mean next B to nothing to the exhibitor who is trying to resell the picture to =_ the public. You can go right down the line of the ads in any B of the trade papers and pick the same old stock phrases — E " Powerful, heart-throbbing story of redemption through love," " One of the most unique screen stories ever offered B the exhibitor," " So and so at his or her very best." This is all right, but the public want to know a little some B thing of the story they are going to see, and how are we to B let them know unless we give each picture a once-over per ( sonally. Pictures that I go to the city to see I can put over B much better than those that I have to depend on the press E matter furnished me. If I had intelligent matter on the different attractions I am j to run it would save me many a trip to Portland and many a B dollar, as I make many trips to see pictures I am to book B just for the simple reason I want to know how to plug them B and cannot get any idea worth while from the press matter J furnished me. In regard to paper, some of it seems to have been selected g with no more idea to the play than a child would have. I B would rather have a stock one-sheet of a star than many of B the scenes that are shown and purported to be from the play. M Another thing, in most times found in the two-reel comedies B now on the market : One will get a bunch of stills and ex B hibit them in his lobby, then when you run the comedy find B maybe one scene in the whole bunch that is in the film. The 3 rest all cut out in the editing of the comedy. I think the stills B should be sorted and edited as well as the picture, because §§ the dear public comes out of your place of business and won 9 ders, very audibly, of course, if your operator hasn't cut out B part of the show. / 'want to thank you for the new department just started in m the News, namely the Complete Plan Book. It is just 'what B we have been needing to help us put over the stuff and will B help many a poor exhibitor who is racking his brain for an B idea as to how he shall put this or that over. ililiiiiiiiM be light music so popular songs can be employed. Ought to Be an Event In short, the presentation of these pictures ought to be made an event in the history of your theatre. You have been reading in the Motion* Picture Xews about the motion picture being held an essential and about the various roles that it has been playing in winning the war. You have a chance now to make it play a part in your own theatre. The few special pictures that were made at the time of the Third Loan were shown in comparatively few theatres and therefore the public in general did not get a good idea of what the industry is doing. Now, with thirty-seven different ones available there will certainly be opportunity for every theatre to show at least some of them. And if we were conducting a theatre we would set out to get every one that we could show in the campaign, and we would go about it with as much energy as we would for a record-breaking production. And after you get them, do not use them merely as fillers and ignore them in your daily exploitation. Show that you yourself appreciate the importance of them and you will have gone a long way to convincing the public in general that the photoplay is a real war-time necessity, and the theatre likewise. We believe that you will be surprised by the way these pictures are received by your patrons, the enthusiasm that they arouse, the new interest in motion pictures generally that they create. ADVISORY BOARD, EXHIBITORS SERVICE BUREAU Samuel L. Rothaplel, Rlalto and RItoU theatres. New York. Thomas D. Sorlero, Park theatre, Boston, and Strand theatre*. Lowell. Harold B. Franklin. Shea's Hippodrome, Buffalo. Edw. L. Hyman, Film Director, U. 8. Liberty Theatres, New York. E. Handlebaum, Loew's Stillman theatre, Cleveland. Mrs. Joseph Grossman, Standard theatre, Cleveland. George J. Schade, Schade theatre, Sandusky. H. C. Horater, Alhambra theatre, Toledo. S. Barret McCormick, Circle theatre, Indianapolis. Theo. L. Hays, New Garrick theatre, St. Paul. M. W. HcGee, Majestic theatre, Detroit. Chas. G. Branham, Strand theatre, Minneapolis. Leo A. Landau, Butterfly theatre, Milwaukee. Charles C. Perry, Buffalo theatre, Camp Upton, N. Y. W. S. McLaren, Majestic and Colonial Theatres, Jackson, Mich. Miss Flossie A. Jones, Waukesha Amusement Co., Waukesha, Wis. WLUard C. Patterson, Criterion theatre, Atlanta, Ga. E. Y. Richards, Jr., General Manager, Saenger Amusement Co., New Orleans. Ernst Boehringer, Liberty theatre. New Orleans. C. A. Lick, New theatre. Fort Smith, Ark. F. L. Newman, Royal and Regent theatres, Kansas City, Mo. H. M. Thomas, Strand theatre, Omaha. Ralph Ruffner, Rialto theatre, Butte. A. H. Hilton, Paramount Theatre, Lewlston, Idaho. George E. Carpenter, Paramount-Empress theatre. Salt Lake. Sam W. B. Colin, Liberty theatre, Spokane. G. F. Fullerton, Advertising Manager, Greater Theatres Co., Seattle. E. J. Myrick, Liberty theatre, Portland, Ore. A. S. Kolstad, Liberty theatre, Hood River, Ore. P. E. Noble, Publicity Manager, Liberty and Columbia theatres, Seattle. Eugene H. Roth, California theatre, San Francisco. J. A. Partington, Imperial theatre, San Francisco. Sidney Graoman, Grauman's theatre, Los Angeles. m iiiiiiBraiiiiiiiiiiioiiiffli ill