Movies for TV - Early Television Foundation

CHOOSING FILMS FORTY 249
Titles should be watched with special care; this particularly
applies to main titles since subtitles very seldom appear in talkies.
If at all
possible, avoid films which contain a sequence in which
one of the players reads a letter, or in which the action hinges on
the message in a letter which is shown in a close-up for the audi-
ence to read. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the viewers
are unable to read what is written on the letter and consequently
lose the thread of the story. This may seem a small point, but it is
the small points which help to keep an audience for a station. If
people find trouble reading the title of the program to take the
worst case they are likely to tune out and find a better one on
another station.
When the titles are examined, note if the lettering is large with
only
a few words in each main or sub title. Check to see if it is
brilliant white on black this may cause trouble with "smear,"
i.e., streaking of blacks over whites or vice versa. If necessary,
have new titles made for it and splice them in, in place of the
original, for the air-showing. It won't cost much and may make
a big difference to the loyalty of the audience.
Another point which hardly belongs here, and yet, since we
are discussing ways of being kind to the listener and holding him,
be sure that your films are at the station in plenty of time for the
program. If a film is advertised for Sunday, the tenth, have that
film come hell or high water! Don't do what one big metropoli-
tan station did, and advertise some really good films for every
Sunday evening, and then without warning of the change, put on
something entirely different. In the case in question, many viewers
invited parties to see these specially good movies. Their disgust can
be imagined when something entirely different came on without
any apology. They felt silly and their friends as well as they
themselves felt cheated.
Make sure all the film is on the station in the projection booth
before the show begins. On one occasion, a New York station
let's call it station "X" was showing a western film. All went
well until time for the change to the next reel. On came a sequence
of "The Shadow." After a few minutes the announcer apologized