Variety (August 1958)

SO PICTIJRES J^fHETY Wednesday, August 13,1958 playing foreign films, they can build a. new audience for them¬ selves also should be willing tip stake a little money on that con¬ viction, Fred J. Schwartz, prez. of Disrtibutors Corp. of America* commented in N.Y. last week: Imports, said Schwartz, are like olives. After you’ve consumed enough of them, you acquire a taste for them. He feels it’s some¬ what the same with foreign films. "But it takes. time/ patience and effort,” he commented. “Let an ex¬ hibitor lose alittle money for a while, if necessary, while he builds that new auidence. After all, that’s his capital investment.” DCA, which Originally got into the business with the idea of fi¬ nancing more-and major American production, finally is in the black, Schwartz reported. Year ending this month (DCA’s fourth, year of operation) will show a small profit for the first time, thanks to the success of such releases as “Go'i of Naples;” “Rodan,” “private’s Progress,” “Rouge et Noir” etc. Practically all. of DCA’s roster comes from abroad. Schwartz bitterly complained about the ‘‘crazy” advances which, some of the competing, independ¬ ents give to foreign producers. He made it clear that DCA couldn’t and wouldn't try to compete with them. “Considering, the uncertain-: ties of the market, these $200,000 and $300,000 advance guarantees are absolutely mad,” he said. The DCA .topper confirmed that his company was pulling in its horns and had closed quite a num¬ ber of offices. It’ll stabilize with around 10 exchanges. Outfit now has enough film to last it through November, and is acquiring addi¬ tional product to reach into the new year. He plans to go to Europe in the fall to o.o. films. Already acquired by DCA is a Czech opera film, “Dalibor.” Which is in color. Having handled a number of Ger¬ man releases. DCA has had mixed experiences with them, Schwartz reported. “Hauptmann von Koepe- nick” which has opened only at the 72d St. Playhouse in N.Y., has done very well. It’ll be followed by another DCA German release at that theatre. “Affairs of Lisa,” with Maria Schell and O. W. Fisch¬ er. The original title was “Dream¬ ing Lips.” which Elizabeth Berg- ner first made. Another German film. “The Dev¬ il’s General.” will gross up to $150,000. Schwartz said. ‘‘Adven¬ tures of Felix Krull.” on the other band, and the exploitation release, "Teenage V/olfpack,” have disap¬ pointed in States. Japanese “Rodan.”. a science fic¬ tion thriller dubbed into English, will gross $1,300,000 in the U.S- and Canada, Schwartz estimated. . Schwartz is working on a deal to reactivate “Finiaii's Rainbow,” which DCA started in its-first year, but had to drop when it lost im¬ portant financial backing.. Schwartz still hasn’t given up hope of bring¬ ing DCA back to its original pur¬ pose which was to finance and re¬ lease producti on h ere an d ab road. Donald LaBadie to Paris Donald LaBadie, publicity and p.r. man at the French Film Office in Manhattan, goes to France Aug. 22 to establish more effective liai¬ son between the N. Y. office and Unifrance and also to cooperate with several mags on stories they are planning on French stars. He’ll be gone about a month and is including his vacation. ‘SWEET TASTE OF FIRE' Walter LowfOdabl Picks Story Of An Evangelist As the first project marking his reentry in the theatrical film pro¬ duction field, Walter Lovvendahl, [who heads a company bearing his name, will film “The Sweet Taste of Fire/’ a story about an evangel¬ ist and his followers by Maxime Furland. . Alexander Hammid has been chosen to direct the film, which is Lowendahi’s first since he pro¬ duced the film version of Gian-Car- lo Menotti’s “The Medium/’ Until recently, Lowendahl was president of Transfilm' Inc., a tv commercial and business film firm with which he is still associated as general consultant. !. The United States film industry must evolve a firm policy in rela¬ tion torits. participation in film fes¬ tivals—“either we get right in or right out.” That is the considered view of Alfred E. Daff, Universal’s executive v.p. . who v recently re¬ turned from the Berlin Film Fes- j tivaL Daff, who believes that certain festivals are a strong asset to the U.S. industry, makes the point that the U.S. must make a strong rep¬ resentation or withdraw from ail festivals completely. ‘‘The industry Should take a hard look at festi¬ vals,” he declared. “We should do it right or get out There is no room for. half-hearted effortst.” He declined to specify exactly which festivals the U.S. Industry should lend its all-out support but he called attention to the import¬ ance of French, Italian and Ger¬ man markets. Asked if the U.S. in¬ dustry should seek additional sup¬ port and cooperation from the U.S.- State Department, Daff declared that it-was a matter for the indus¬ try. as a whole to decide. The U executive emphasized that the presence of American film per¬ sonalities was extremely important and that “we should show our strength that way.” “If American stars are not there, foreign person¬ alities are played up/’ he declared: Full Sail to Venice Denia, Spain, Aug. 12. There is talk ’here in the "John Paul Jones” location company of sailing the fighting "frigate, “Bonhomme Richard,” across the Mediterranean and up the Adriatic to drop anchor , in the Grand Canal off Venice during the film festival at the Lido. It’s a pipedream of pub¬ licists Bob Taplinger and Phil Gersdorf; ' A; natural for the assembled press and newsreels, as they see it. Actor Robert, Stack • would be on the bridge in cos- . tume while, thousands gape on the Piazza de San Marco. Ac¬ tual skipper would be Captain Alan Villiers of Mayflpwer, 1957 renown. ; Frisco Festival San Francisco, Aug.. 12. Some 17 nations have so far.sub- mitted films to the. San Francisco Film Festival starting Oct 29. Countries- which have promised are: Australia, China, Czechoslo¬ vakia, Denmark, France, West Ger¬ many, Britain, Greece, Hungary, In¬ dia,. Israel, Italy, Japan. New Zea¬ land, Spain, Sweden and the U. S. At least one independent pro¬ ducer will guarantee “American participation,” said the fete’s direc¬ tor, Trying M.. Levin. [ Entries . will be screened after the Sept. .1 submission deadline and a program formulated then for the tWp-week festival. On Remarque’s Feature; . Bonn Later ‘Forgot ft’ In discussing the overall Issue of foreign film festivals, A1 Daff, Uni-, versa! Pictures exec, , discloses that tiie West German government ap¬ parently made an effort to stop the showing of the film version of Erich Maria Remarque’s hoveL “A Time to Love and a Time to Die” at the Berlin Festival. : I Bonn officials had contacted Fred .Gronich, MPEA European staffer, indicating that the picture might not be welcome by the West German government. A ; month later the same official asked Gro¬ nich if Universal would consent to withdraw the picture, voluntarily. Universal told Gronich that U would take under consideration the withdrawal of the film if the West German government made ui offi¬ cial request •. This U move, Daff stated, result¬ ed in a telephone call. “to forget the whole thing” and the picture was shown in Berlin as scheduled. Daff added that he did.not know if any pressure was applied to the festival committee by the govern¬ ment, but he Indicated that the fes¬ tival officials had won his /‘ad¬ miration and respect” by honoring the invitation. 14 Features on Venice, Aug. 12. By ROBERT F. HAWKINS *‘B] a ck Orchid” (Paramount), directed by Martin Ritt and star- . ring Sophia Loren, and “God’s Little Acre” (U.A.)/directed by Anthony Mann, have been officially designated the U.S. entries in the. 19th Venice Film Festival. Decision followed the screening of oyer 100 submissions from all over the world by the three-man selection committee of the festival composed of well-known Italian film critics.. The Festival pointedly thanked all governmental and production organizations, that helped make the selection possible: In addition to Hollywood, eight other nations will be in the run¬ ning for the Venice prizes. Britain Will show'“The Horse’s Mouth,” directed by Ronald Neame with Alec Guinness. (Pic also- has a. U.A. release). France has-three features in competition: Claude Antant Lara’s “En C.as de Malheur,” Louis Malle’s “Les AmantS,”* and Alexandre Astruc’s “Une. Vie,” starring Maria Scheli. Italy has only one contender: Francesco Rosi’a “La Sfida,” while Japan has two: “Muhomatsu no Issho,” directed by H. Igana, and “Narayama Bushi Ko” (The Legend of 4 Narayama), Other contestants are listed, as follows: “Otar’s Wife,” directed by N. Ciaurelf, .(Russia) ; “ylci Jama.” (The Fox’s Den), directed [ by Jid Weiss, (Czechoslovakia); “Nattens Ljus” (The Lights of the Night), directed by Kjellgreri, (Sweden); and Rolf" Thiele's “Rosemarie” (Germany). Completing list of 14. 1* Alexander Ford’s "The Fighth Day of the Week,” a Polish-German cmprbduction which was yanked from this spring’s Canned Film. Festival, ostensibly because of some comments made by one of its authors at a French press interview. A Spanish-Italian co-production, “Soledad,” will be screened - on the last night of the Festival, but out of competition. It is a feature documentary directed by Enrico Gras and Mario CraverL Winners at Pula Festival Pula, Aug. 5. The Jadran production, “H 8,” story of an actual highway acci¬ dent, became winner of the Fifth Yugoslavian Film Festival (Pula) Which came to a close here last week. Another Jadran feature “The One Year Long Road,” captured second prize. “Road,” In¬ cidentally, may be called Titoland’s most expensive film' of all times: Its budget amounted to the locally sensational sum of 300,- 000,000 Dinar ($750,000) and the director, Italian, Giuseppe De Santis- collected 30,000,000, or $75,000, also a huge sum if one "takes into consideration that Yugoslav directors make hardly more than $8,000 per film. . “Road” has been made with export hopes and no Yugoslav di¬ rector would mean anything abroad. To give this film European marquee, value, the Italian stars Silvana Pampanini, Eleonora Ros- si-Drago and Massimo Girotti were hired. The domestic cast in- - eludes Bert Sotlar, Gordana Miletic, Ivo Pajer and Stefanini. Director De Santis attended the showing of his film at Pula. Titoland’sPreoccupation With Tito’s Struggle Against Nazis—^Films’Big Function Brigitte’s Next : Paris, Aug. 12; Brigitte Bardot’s next for Columbia Pictures release will be “Babette Goes to War,” Original written by her pro¬ ducer, Raoul Levy. Yarn, in which French ac¬ tress plays a Free French es¬ pionage agent in World War n, rolls in September. Houses Feauned Rome, Aug. 12. The entire Rome Theatre circuit operated by Italo Gemini has passed into the hands ef the gov¬ ernment-subsidized ECI circuit. Latter, run by Torello Ciucci, re¬ cently took over the bankrupt and equally government-aided ENIC operation. The danger of a government film house monopoly is seen by some local industry suorces as a conse¬ quence of this move. These per¬ sons point out (at this writing the exact number of houses in the transaction is not known) that vir¬ tually all but three first-run Rome showcases are in the hands of the ECI group. Remainder belong to Giovanni Amati, felt to be a hold¬ out lone wolf at this point.'Amati is said to have tendered his resig¬ nation to AGIS, the Italo exhib as¬ sociation. Grapevine has it that more shake-1 ups are coming up in the harried and unsettled exhib sector. At least one other Important AGIS exec will ankle the theatreowner or¬ ganization here in the near future, one local pundit avers. ALEX HARRISON SUMS UP V Patronage Good A« Product* Fine—If Not, Ugh! Minneapolis, Aug. 12: [ Here in the interest of the Will Rogers Memorial fund, Alex Har¬ rison, 20th-Fox sales head, de¬ clared: that his company's fall- winter lineup of pictures “un¬ questionably” will be the strongest ever "all down the line” it has consecutively furnished exhibitors. Harrison himself is confident that because of this product and an exceptionally high average of qual¬ ity releases from other companies the* balance of 1958 will witness boxoffice prosperity. However, he points out, this will be a teat If the public doesn’t! support there attractions in a man-j ner profitable to all industry 1 branches “on the whole," the long¬ term outlook likely will be bleak, he feels. Harrison was host at a luncheon attended by 25 local exhibitors who were enlisted In the Rogera cam¬ paign. By HANS HOEHN Pula, Aug, 5. Of the various Festivals in Eu¬ rope, Cannes, Berlin, Venice, San Sebastian, Edinburgh, Locarno, Karlovy Vary, and so on. Pula is perhaps the most obscure. Wholly national it is as impressive, and as mediocre, as the Yugoslav film in¬ dustry, Stories are often imag- . inative; direction less so; acting tends to old fashioned stylized pos¬ turing. But the Yugoslav films, for all that, have made progress; ' Nearly half of the films seen at Pula dealt With partisan political Subjects. Some foreign observers were surprised about this. One should not be. The fight of the Yugoslavian resistance against the German occupation forces cannot be forgotten easily here. These films are not made because of an everlasting grudge against the Ger¬ mans; but because of the important historical chapter they are aide to represent in the country’s—i-and Tito’s—history. The struggle sup- pUes the scriptors with an enor¬ mous amount of story material. Against appeal to native patriotism such features have only slim ex¬ port chances. This Variety reporter spoke with a number of domestic pro¬ ducers. Nearly all said that they have no financial problems, de¬ spite the fact that hardly any do¬ mestic film is able to make enough money to cover full negative cost. Relative to the economy, Yugo¬ slav aid is probably one of the : most generous in the world. First cf all, large .part of the amuse¬ ment tax (20% of each admission ticket) is returned to a special pro¬ duction fund of which 65% is for the producers of features md 35%: for the makers of shorts. The sum made hereby available amounts to about 600,000,000 Dinar (or $15.- 000,000) per year. Moreover, there are. annually, government grants- in-aid amounting to 60.000.000 Dinar and additional allowances which come up to even 300,000,000 Dinar. The Yugoslavian [feature film production amounts to about 15 at present while the production of shorts has reached the number of 200 (possibly . 250. this year). Yu go-’ slayian shorts already have a repu¬ tation of their own. In all, there are 13 production companies, six distribs and one newsreel outfit In the-land- The producing outfits are Avala, Bosna,: Dunav, Jadran, Lovcen. Slavija, Triglav, Ufus, Vardar. Viba. Zag¬ reb, Zastava and Zora. Each of this country’s six regional repnb- Ijcs has its own distributing organ¬ ization. The export-import biz is bandied via Yugoslavija-Film. Each distrib must be a member of this company, for producers it’s not compulsory. . Three are roughly 1,300 cinemas in Yugoslavia, yet not all of them operate permanently. Studios are in. Belgrad, Zagreb and Ljubljana. Stilt on the low side: Star sal¬ aries;: The country’s most prom¬ inent acreenplayres get only a few thousand bucks per Him. Less known actors make hardly more than workmen. Se ft'* understood that only Very few fffiu people have • a. car ef their ewa here. No star, ctdtae yet. GeneTtoHsIl Atahtee lns; has been, authorised to condoct a moi- tlea'MottureaBdtdbHdrion business im New whit capital stock of 20t shares act par vafua. Welnrib $e/Weinrib of lirebettasi are ftiing attoreaya Albany, t autherisedv to conduct » film »pin# burin—a In Long island county. capital it fs 20t> alifore. no par value, inn A Greenberg: of Manhattan,, n JUlni' atterneva at Albany.