Great Falls tribune., 1921-12-04
"a photoplay for broad-minded peo-

"A pheotoplay for broad-minded peo-
pie only"
-Four quotations! Just four. taken
from a number of recent advertise
ments Of motion picture exhibitors.
What is their appeal? What can
expect from the pictures they adver-
tise? Did the exhibitors who wrote
them and had them printed intend that
they should appeal to any but the
baser, the prurient side Of human ma
ture?
Word by word, perhaps, they are not
deliberately bad. But in them is the
substratum of clever, subtle suggestive
ness which means but one thing, is in
tended to convey but one impression
salaciousness. Whether or not the pic
lures advertised were salacious, the ex-
hibitors intended that prospective spec
tators should believe them SO.
Hurting Motion Pictures
Such advertising is working an infin
ite amount of harm to one of America s
biggest industries. 1t is giving the man
in the street the wrong impression of
the business as a whole; is giving the
so-called reformers just the chance
they are looking for to get material on
which to base their attacks on motion
pictures. Such advertising should be
stamped out-not only for the benefit
of a great industry, but also for the
rood Of the mediums that carry it and
the readers who find it thrust before
heir eyes.
For moment consider the history
of the motion picture business. Not
50 many years ago motion picture
was curiosity, sandwiched in be-
tween the Dancing Nellies and the
Moscolni Brothers on the average
vaudeville program. A few men of vi
sion saw that this toy had future;
that it fulfilled want by giving a great
mass of people entertainment and in
struction Of the highest order at prices
which would make it possible for them
to enjoy good entertainment at mod
crate cost. And then almost overnight
the business grew until it surpassed in
magniture anything of which its early
exponents had ever dreamed.
Too Important an Industry
Today the motion picture industry is
represented by millions of dollars in
vested in producing companies and the
aters. Every year millions of specta-
tors pass in and out of motion picture
theaters all over the country. 1t is a
gigantic industry, which spends millions
in advertising and uses about every
possible medium in almost every city
and town in the United States.
And yet-every day this industry
finds itself forced to defend itself
against the attacks of those who point
to it as morally rotten.
There are in the United States about
$4,000 motion picture theaters, grading
from the largest in our greater cities to
converted stores in small hamlets.
Each one Of these theaters is in reality
only a retail store purveying to a given
amount Of consumers certain num-.
Der of feet of commodity. SO many
units Of entertainment Each theater
owner or exhibitor is only a retailer.
He advertises as does any other re-
taller. and the producing companies
furnish him with all sorts of dealer
help material--from mats and electros
to lobby displays and posters. And ap-
the producing companies exer-
else no more control over his adver-
tising than the manufacturer of hard
ware does over that Of the individual
hardware dealer.
1t Is a Show Business
The motion picture business Is the
show business-just as truly as DE
burau" or Ringling's circus is the show
business. In its early days 1t attracted
to it number of gentlemen whose code
of ethics was learned in the shadow
of side show, who received their
mathematical education in short chang
ing unsuspecting. peasants who had
come 20 miles to see the clowns. These
individuals brought with them all the
"hokum" that had been imbedded in