Report on blacklisting : 1 Movies ([1956])

Record Details:

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(RKO). And since the public had shown its interest at the box-office in this more adult kind of movie fare, the industry began to move ahead on other productions of this kind, which would explore social problems through the personal story of a few individuals. That this type of movie had reached what was undoubtedly an all-time high, is suggested by PCA figures for the last half of 1947, which show that 28 per cent of the industry product was being devoted to social theme movies, or to films dealing with psychological problems (a very popular type of movie at that time). From the standpoint of change in movie content the years 1947-1954 appear to fall into three periods. In the first of these, roughly 1947-1949, social and psychological themes in movies began to decline, dropping from 28.0 per cent of the product in the last half of 1947, to 20.2 per cent in 1948 and to 17.7 per cent in 1949. Although throughout this period —and to a lesser extent throughout the period that followed — some social theme movies continued to be made, there was an ever-smaller number of them. Still, in this initial period, 1947-1949, there were many outstanding productions of this type —for example, THE SNAKE PIT (20th Century-Fox, 1948), which treated mental illness; ALL THE KING'S MEN (Columbia, 1949) and a number of films treating the Negro problem in the United States, including Kazan's PINKY (20th Century-Fox), INTRUDER IN THE DUST (M-G-M), and HOME OF THE BRAVE (Screen Plays —U.A.), the latter all released in 1949. And in this same year — the first year in which Hollywood began to be seriously concerned about the effects of television upon box-office receipts, a new cycle of war films began to appear. The first of these was BATTLEGROUND (M-G-M), which surprised many in the industry by turning out to be a top box-office success, and was soon followed during the same year by TWELVE O'CLOCK HIGH (20th Century-Fox), with many other war stories going into production, and many old war films being pulled out of the vaults for hasty re-issue. It was in the second period, however, 1950-1952, that the most clear-cut change in the content of Hollywood films occurred. The 1950-1952 years were characterized not only by more war films (of the sure-fire patriotic variety) but by fewer social theme movies, by a greater emphasis throughout the industry on what is sometimes called "pure entertainment" — and by a large number of anti-Communist films. The number of pictures dealing with social and psychological problems, which had been declining in the previous several years, now took a sharp drop — from 17.7 per cent in 1949 to 11.7 per cent and 12.5 per cent in 1950 and 1951 respectively. This drop is even more evident if psychological stories are eliminated from the totals: the social problem film in 1949 ac- counted for 16.5 per cent of the product; in 1950 this figure dropped to 8.9 per cent and in 1951 to 9.0. Films dealing with crime or crime investigations 219