Motography (Jan-Jun 1918)

April 6, 1918. M O T O G R A P H Y 665 Department and a committee of the National Association, working together, have prepared seventeen thousand five hundred trailers. These films will be sent to every motion picture theatre throughout the land. The trailer runs fifty feet and opens with the new Liberty Loan flag followed by a view of Secretary McAdoo at his desk writing a message to the people on the new loan. Next comes a close-up of the message followed by a close-up of the Liberty Loan button, which concludes the film. The message which will be flashed on the screens by this film reads: We must support our gallant sailors and soldiers. We must make them swift victors in their fight with the Kaiser. We can do it if we at home do our duty with the same quality of patriotism that animates our men in the trenches. The least duty we can perform — and we should be eager and happy to perform it — is to lend our money, every available dollar we have and can save, to our government in order that our gallant sons may be supplied with all they need to save America. No true patriot will fail to buy United States Liberty Bonds. — Wm. G. McAdoo. With this film there will be distributed 100,000 posters, five to each theatre and twenty to each exchange. These posters have been prepared under the supervision of the committee in collaboration with the Government and present illustrations of great patriotic appeal. They are the creations of such artists as Howard Chandler Christy, Louis J. Dresser, Franklin Booth, H. H. Green and Harry S. Bressler. The committee is urging exhibitors everywhere to put this material to the best possible use, running the film at every show, not merely as a trailer, but separate and apart from any other film, thus giving it added distinction. These films are presented to exhibitors gratis. They are not to be returned but may be kept by those who receive them. Both film and paper will be mailed direct to the theatre by the Government^ and, it is urged, should be used throughout the entire duration of the forthcoming campaign. The Film Division of the Committee on Public Information has opened New York offices, the better to assist the picture industry in realizing its opportunities to help. The Government itself is continuously producing films conveying the vast accumulation of information in the hands of the committee. These pictures showing all the complex activities of the war will be available to exhibitors under a plan soon to be announced. It goes without saying that their exhibition will be a patriotic duty with a flavor that the word "duty" does not always carry — the satisfaction brought by pleased audiences. The theatre men are turning over to the Government every month huge sums in war taxes collected from the people. They are buying Liberty Bonds out of their own funds, they are contributing to the Red Cross and donating to it the use of their theatres for its benefit performances. For all these things they are duly honored; yet their greatest usefulness lies beyond the personal equation, in their tremendous influence upon people who, perhaps, are not so easily moved as they. There should be a Liberty Bond button on the lapel of every exhibitor. And in his audience there should be a thousand Liberty Bond buttons on a thousand lapels, put there at least indirectly by the power of his screen. That is what the Government is counting on, and that is the opportunity to serve that will be welcomed by one hundred per cent of the picture theatre men. Bookkeeping TO those who know little of accounting, it sounds rather fantastic to say that the difference between profit and loss is often a matter of bookkeeping. Yet many an exhibitor, because he ignores certain items of expense, does not really know whether he is making or losing money. There are three items in particular which often confuse the records of the small theatre owner — his own salary; interest on the whole investment, and depreciation on the property. The exhibitor who pays himself no fixed salary, but merely pockets what he calls the "profits," may be actually making less money than he could get elsewhere as an employee. On the other hand, the exhibitor who pays himself a larger salary than he could reasonably expect from another employer is robbing the real profits of his business, and may imagine his theatre is losing money when it actually is making money. There are equal chances for error in the accounting, or lack of accounting, for interest and depreciation. These subjects we will discuss later. P. H. W.