Variety (April 1959)

84 1IVTEBSATIOX.4I, FILMS PSkIETY Wednesday, April 15, 1959 No Production to Protect So Belgium Welcomes AD Comers By JOHN FLORQUIN ‘ Brussels. a ’ A nation with no film production of its own, Belgium draws on'the output of all film centres of the world, with America and France battling for supremacy, Germany (especially in the Flemish-speaking part of the country), Great Britain and Italy following in their wake, and films from anywhere else mod¬ estly filling the left-over gaps. Just the Bally Needed New Delhi. Interesting yarn has just come out of Soviet Russia. In¬ dian dancer Indrani Rehman is on a European tour with her troupe, presenting classical dances typical of Bharata Nat- yam, Orissi, Mohini Attam, various regions of India, Oris¬ si drew more enthusiastic ap¬ plause in other Continental countries, but in Moscow, the Mohini Attam dance brought down the house. A puzzled Miss Rehman finally found out the reason. The Russian announcer said, when introducing it: “This is the dance of Kerala, India’s first Communist state.” But Head Educator Hits Hoflywood Beat-’Em-Ups By EMIL MAASS But in spite of this lack of na-: tive product—it would be absurd to call by that name some cheaply ; made comedies concocted in Flan¬ ders and meant for local consump¬ tion only—this apron-sized country ; nevertheless has a handful of would-be “film producers” who, for . years, have tried, mostly in words. A-| K f|4j| l c Anti-fencnr to call into existence a semblance » A™ tenSOF of a national film industry. Accent on Shorts ; The only films made on native ! soil are documentaries imanv of' them governmentally sponsored) and shorts. Some are good. o'.hors . hopelessly bad. They defend the Belsiru co’ours at interna' ional film festivals. Filin critics are among tho^c ic'.io have tried, their shhls at documentaries, thus put Hug themselves in the posh ion of j)an>iing the art of Hollywood, Paris . London, Rome, Ham¬ burg, Berlin, etc., while a■ the same time showing that they cannot do so well themselves. Havi’ng no native production to defend, the Belgium goverment makes it easy to all these who want to import their films. Tnus Bel¬ gium is that exception in a com- Mystery of Show Biz Paris. For the second year in a row there are no American plays listed for the Theatre des Na¬ tions festival, which is current and includes plays from about 20 nations. America will be represented, however, by. the Jerome Robbins ballet troupe and-—life being what it is— Britain will be represented by the American production of “Ulysses in Nighttown,” as as acted by Zero Mostel and a New York cast. Nobody knows quite how to explain the last. Itemized Elements In French Films - Paris. In 1952 an “average” French film feature cost $120,000. Today the budget would work out double, or $240r,000. Using the latter fig¬ ure, the breakdown- of items going into a French motion picture would work out thusly: Story . $13,200 ( 5.5Ccl Direction . S38.880 (16.2^) Players . $48,000 ( 20^) Studios ....... $43,200 ( 18~c) Exteriors ..... $14,400 ( 6^) Film and Lab . $16,800 ( 7r c ) Insurance .... $24,000 ( lQ^c) $41,520 117.3^) French Film-Makers Summary French-Italian Co-Productions 1949—(2); 1950—(5); 1951—<6); 1952—(9); 1953—(22); 1954— (19); 1955—(13); 1956—(23); 1957—(29); 1958—(22)! During Same Period ’Coproductions with: Yugoslavia (1>; Belgium (1); U.S. (D; Great Britain (1); Hungary (1); Australia (2); China (1); Japan (1); Lich- enstein (1). Vienna. Austria, since it came out from under the shotgun wedding to. Germany under the eye of Hitler, j Miscellaneous has written into its constitution! .... ' a prohibition against censorship, j To ^ a ^ $<240,uuu as such. But there is here a defi- j —: nite tendency to resist American : • i> • nil* violence * themes. ? Striking Paris labDie When the Minister of Educa-i n l p.i tion, Dr. Heinrich Drimmel, spoke j DriVCFS 1)6111311(1 rUffiS over the radio following the fail- ! ure of an effort at “self-control” \ of the screen he stated that there! would be no end to the campaign | to stop the flood of wild, neurotic..} cruel, foreign youths. Everybody knew he meant Yank shoot-’em- monwealth of European nations ups and beat-’em-ups, though he all of which invent more and more did not so specify. restrictions to protect their own interests. The sign “welcome to Belgium” is up permanently as far as films are concerned. And that goes also for dubbed versions of foreign product. French dubbing is done in Paris and serves for Bel¬ gium as well. There is no need for dubbing—or very little—in the Flemirii-speaking part. Subtitling of films shown in their original version, a current practice here, at least in first runs in Brussels and all over the Flanders, is a pros¬ perous business. With no serious language barrier. English and Ger¬ man being widely spoken en plus of French and Flemish, a serious problem is being simplified to the outmost. U.S. Losing Ground? Really good films always find an attentive audience whatever their nationality or their genre. Thus amongst the comfortable g-’o.scrs of la t year the Russian “Oanes Are Flying” did very well. Never¬ theless. two of the three top-gross- ers of 1958 are American: “Around the World in 80 Days,” “The Ten Commandments.” and “The Bridge on the River Kwai.” The two films immediately following as gros-ers are the French: “My Unc:e” and “Une Parisienne.” But in the Fiem-. ish part of the country, the Gc man “Trapp Family” succeeded in beating even “The Bridge on the River Kwai.” There is immense competition between the three nations. America, France and Germany. And France \ is making steady progress v hile ; Hollywood product has lost ground. Too many inferior films are to be | blamed for that. Sending over in- j discriminately the best and the: worst has not improved the posi-. tion of America here. j Television? More than 280.000 j sets are now keeping at home a j very important fraction of the, public. i The Vienna government is seek¬ ing to persuade the provinces to surrender part of their authority to the Federal republic so that what is euphemistically called Depict Them as Smart Paris, April 14. Among the list of demands made ■ by the Paris cabdrivers, during a recent 24-hour strike, was that ( films should no longer show scenes; in which hackies were knocked over the head and robbed. Pix j also were not to show them as too ; stupid since passengers might get: ‘semi-censorship” could be organ- id eas an< l take advantage of them, ized. Just how strong the Catholic ! Or so they reasoned, j Church pressure is cannot be con-' Austerity measures, leading to fidentlv asserted. The Austrians rises in prices but frozen wage! are reasonably easy-going as a levels or salaries not keeping pace ! rule. with prices, led to the strike. Taxi Catholic Film Press and the.’drivers also wanted more pay and j “Good Film Action” so f 3 r do no lower , living costs. j harm to the business. First is | They also want the right to re- very lenient in its classification, fuse a fare when on their way! Second set-up, founded by' the home and to go off duty, if not! Film Journalists Society, recently ; going in the same direction. The organized its own free telephone state subsidized radio and video!. service (dial 1513) to give “good setup also had a reecnt 24-hour films v information. “Mock trials' against “bad films’ are being held, and organized letters are ad¬ dressed to the American Embassy to help “combat bad films.” Ministry of Education has a three star system for classifying pictures: One star: worthy to be seen. Two stars: valuable. Three stars: especially valuable. layoff in a demand for wage boosts. Actors also have struck: it’s feared there maiy be bad strikes during j the tourist season which, would affect show biz considerably. Paris Dubbing Visas Paris. Films from outside France which secured dubbing permits here during recent . statistical computation years give this fairly steady pulse: 1952 - 195 1953 215 1954 - 209 1955 - 222 1956 - 219 1957 - 201 1958 - 216 LADY CHATTERLEY’ IN , TOP COURT APRIL 20 Washington, April 14. U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments on New York ■ state’s ban on “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” during the week of April ; 20. i Kingsley International Pictures ; challenged the constitutionality of the ban imposed by the New York Board of Regents under the state’s censorship law, and appealed the case after losing out in state courts. Each party will have an hour of argument before the Supreme Court. fy/uuice'd. Bixf Qelmcut Market De Miile Retrospective : follows: Paramount Pictures is making available footage on a number of Cecil B. DeMille films for a “De¬ Mille Retrospect” at the Cannes film festival, which starts May 1. Show will be about one hour and will honor the work of DeMille. Several European film museums and libraries also are contributing clips from DeMill# works. Brutality, Boozing, Evil And Snrgery Can’t Get By Censors in India By AUSTEN NAZARETH New Delhi. Every film—feature, short suh- ject, trailer, or whatever—shown . in an Indian theatre is preluded by the flashing on the screen of . a facsimile of the censor certificate: by law, every film must be certified before it is exhibited. The Central Board of Film Censors grants certificates to films under two classifications: “passed for un-' restricted public exhibition” (U, 1 for imrestrieted); and “passed for public exhibition restricted to t adults” (A, for adults). In the 11-month period April . 1958 to February 1959, the board i granted U certificates to 2.465 films and A certs to 121. Some 63 ’ were refused certification. Film footage excised by the censors . totaled 58,250. Censor board is appointed by! the Indian Government. In a. country with a tradition of more ‘ governmental regulation of public} affairs than in the United States— ‘ a heritage from the days of British imperial rule which independence has not dissipated—the temper of . public opinion evinces a far less-! than-American readiness to resent and resist censor-regulation. Official spokesmen stress that ( the system is not oppressive. “Indian film censorship is both sensible and democratic,” a Gov-. ernment official said to Variety. He pointed out that an examining committee passes on each film. If its verdict is unfavorable, pic goes before a revising committee. If it’s still thumbs-down, producer, can put it up to an appellate com- f mittee. ! Each committee consists of a ■ fresh set of personnel—all non¬ officials but one, in each case— and producer is given full oppor¬ tunity to put his case at each stage in the process. What are the sensitive areas in application of censorship to films? In addition to the more general and predictable ones in the field , of crime, vice, sex, and undress.: some other characteristic -ones may be mentioned: Drunkenness or drinking that is not essential to the theme of the story (some states in India are dry, or partially so); Surgical, operations. Feminine underclothing. Cruelty to children. Torture of adults. Cruelty to animals Traffic in drugs. . . Accentuation of class distinc¬ tions or stimulating class hatred. Realistic horrors of warfare. Intimate biological detail. ✓ Gross travesties of the adminis¬ tration of justice. Considered unsuitable for certi¬ fication is a foreign film “of a propaganda nature” which “is likely to arouse disrespect of a foreign country, or is liable to be looked upon by a foreign country as derogatory to itself, or which is liable to embarrass the relations of the Government of India with any foreign government,” or which contains “disparaging ref¬ erences to the people of a foreign country or the head of a foreign State” or “picturization of sub¬ versive methods or of guerrilla technique.” This would bar some anti-Soviet films from Hollywood and some anti-Capitalist films from Russia. New French Law Aids Pix Writers * Paris, April 14. A new law is to go into effect next week under which film writ¬ ers and directors will be paid via a percentage of the gross income of a pic decided on for each film between the producer and screen¬ writers and directors. Long-debated problem finally got a nod from all filmmaking segments. Under this system, the writers and direc¬ tors are considered the veritable film creators. The distribs, after taxes and exhib shares are de¬ ducted. will give the percentages to the producers and to SACEM. The latter will turn it over to the authors. All advances to the authors will be repaid to producers by SACEM from their collections. In cases of tilm properties based on books, plays or previous ideas, these either will be bought directly or allowed to share in the author’s percentage. New system was first frowned on by producers as likely to cut deeply into their already too small overall percentage of a film’s take. But it was finally felt that it was a share-the-risk affair and a hit would benefit all while a flop might, in the long run, save money for the producer on less payments to the authors. This is a victory for the writers and airectors who could now share in their own work. It is also felt it is a greater incentive so neces¬ sary Li these days of falling film attendance and public disaffection. TV MAY BE, NOT NOW VILLAIN IN FRANCE Paris. Television is still not a definite film threat in France. But theatri¬ cal feature producers, with plenty of troubles in trying to organize themselves to have a common front in-dealing with the governmental film administrative bodies, are prone to use the growing tv as a whipping hoy. Radiodiffusion - Television Fran- caise is now a nationalized indus¬ try rather than a civil service set¬ up. This meant higher salaries could be paid sans doing the same in other governmental bodies. Smarter personnel and production is not expected for at least three or four years. Most film people feel a modus viveiidi should be set up now with tv so as to avoid . the changes it brought about in the film setup in other countries. Taiwan’s 1,652- Seater Washington, April 14. One of the Far Easfs largest and most modern motion picture thea¬ tres' has opened in Formosa (Taiwan). Nathan D. Golden, chief of Com¬ merce’s Scientific, Motion Picture and Photographic Products divi¬ sion, said the “Far East” has 1,652 seats and what is believed to be the largest screen in the Far East, 83 by 36 feet. More than $300,000 is invested (entirely by Taiwanese investors) in it, a new report from the U. S. Embassy in Taipei states. Theatre opened last December. Sound system is of U. S. origin, with six sound channels. The projection equipment is of Jap¬ anese’ manufacture. It is located outside the down¬ town cluster of theatres in Taipei.