The Moving picture world (November 1925-December 1925)

472 MOVING PICTURE WORLD December 5, 1925 Makes An Attractor From the Scene Stills Drawn Layouts Not Just Right Kenneth Long of Gordon's Theatre, Brockton, Mass., sends in a couple of displays and asks for comment. He writes as though he really wanted to know. The chief trouble seems to be that he does not realize the LAST TIMES TO NICHT TO Sit THt KNOCKOUT A Paramount Release TYPE WOULD BE BETTER value of mortises. He has a house artist who is rather good at figures, so he lets him draw the entire display, and the man ii a better artist than he is advertiser. Take this display for "He's a Prince" as an example. The picture is carried in the circle. There is a really good semi-cartoon of Griffith, and j'ou get the name clearly. But the arm with the hat extends mto the spate and the title is badly cramped. Moreover there is a cross on the "P" which results in the letter being half white and half black. You don't get that the first glance and read "He's a rince." Then you go back and get the big idea. Probably the artist does not realize that to letter that title in one quarter the size, but legibly and straight lined will give him a better display than with the larger letters filling the space. It doesn't sound reasonable, but it is a fact. The smaller letter will not only be more legible, and therefore more distinct, but it will permit a little white space that will still further aid the display. Probably it would not pay to mortise under the right arm to let in type, but the lettering should be more dist3nct. This looks as though the lettering had been put in with a brush instead of a pen. This makes for a thick, unreadable letter. But the other spaces, the vaudeville sections, could have been mortised to let in type with no trouble and at very little cost, and all type would have made a much better display. This is a four nines, with the top trimmed off slightly because the copy was pasted to the letter. In that space mortising is a simple proposition and setting in the type is an easy matter. The mortise in the circle would be awkward. Here hand lettering can pass, but in the larger panels with square sides, the setting of a mortise is as simple as setting into the form. The work here is all brush. If we get a result like this from a staff artist we think we would tie him in a chair for a couple of hours and make him look at his botch while we lectured him on his sins. The other example is smaller, a three five and a halfs. Here there is more pen lettering and less brush work. The names are better carried, but the playing days are almost wholly lost through being buried in the line background. We do not know just how they will come through in the cut, but on the original you may entirely overlook them unless you scrutinize the space carefully. Of course the regular patrons know about the split week bookings, but it won't hurt to name the days plainly. Here The Halfway Girl, the film feature, is slighted for the vaudeville acts. It gets prominence because it has a space all to itself, but evidently the press work is trusted to put the story over. The advertisements are merely announcements and not sellers. This is the point where improvement should be made. A little less art work and a little more argument would help not a little. Mr. mmm jB^VAUOCVlLLt ACTS^^lL HARRY PEARCt lXPOSITI0NJm[4 ^^'^^ A LAC^ARTf: 'A SOUTMLRN mm mmr\ CHESTU^DIHOCK "MRS MAHONEY 5 DAY' o o R D OM Ooons Open Performance 1:45 G.6 \5 A First National Release A LITTLE BETTER Long has a lot of bad examples to cite in his defense, for there is no section of the country so hopelessly devoted to "art" work ads as New England. The Boston newspapers are a stench in the advertising nostrils, and the small towns follow the example of the one big city. Mr. Long is doing about what all other New England exhibitors are doing, but we think that if he studied out the working ideas of type ads he would find that it would help the attendance. A single cut and border work would be better than these elaborate art layouts. At the same time they woul be cheaper. If he makes a switch, we shall be glad to see the new examples. Qood Attractor Vrom the Stills This eleven and a half inches across four looks like a pretty sizable ad, but really it is only a part of an advertisement for the Wuerth Theatre, Ypsilanti, Mich., which explains why no signature shows. It makes an attractive space, and the cut carries out the idea of the title with the various characters from the play carrying a day apiece. It appears to be the theatre's own idea. The faces are not very strong likenesses, but the general idea gets over, and the players are listed in the panel on the left, so that they are properly sold, though the main credit goes to Al Christie, as is proper, since you'll remember that it was Christie who made Charley's Aunt, and you could not ask for a better recommendation than that. It's a nice type display and carries good argument, though it would seem that one of the real selling points should be a hint as to the ootncdy knockou!. In all ihc history of wrreen comedy ih«rc hu vver b«n «ich ■ produciton. wch a wprrmely hilanoui Mory. such >n »my of icreen celcbmtCT, » in tha Ut«t from the twdio* of ihc lamous prod^lcef^of feature laugh provokere. The Funniest, Fastest Farce Ever Filmed HELEN .\Nn WARREN COMEDY I'ATHE REVIEW A Producers' Distributing Release MADE FROM THE STILLS nature of the story. One point to be noted is the way the title stands out. It is benday lettering. In a solid black it would not be as prominent as in the lighter tone. This does not sound logical, but it is, if you will realize that a straight black letter would be in stronger competition with the black cards the players carry. It gets more contrast as it stands, and contrast, not size or blackness is what always counts. We do not believe that there is any exception to that rule. Freshman Ad Is Qiven Long Drop J. W. Sayre sends in a display on The Freshman that is so good we are tipping it over on its side to get it into the space. This is the usual space for the Liberty Theatre, Seattle; a cross-column fours less the space taken by the heading, or a drop of a little more than twenty inches across the four. And most of this 170 square inches is white space, and the white space is what sells The Freshman. The picture is entering its third, and final, week at the house. It has been pretty thoroughly sold in the preceding weeks, and now the main point is merely to give emphasis to its retention. That 20 line "Come" will sell more tickets than any elaborate argument, and the "Why dilate on the obvious?" is a touch that convinces. This is a style of display in which Mr. Sayre is at his best. He was using white space to sell when most managers gauged the value of their space by the number of words they were able to cram into it. Even the house signature is