NEW SEASON'S FILMS

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 63, 11 September 1937, Page 6

NEW SEASON'S FILMS

PARAMOUNT CONVENTION

In presiding at the convention of Paramount Pictures, just concluded in Sydney, Mr. Harry Hunter, managing director of the company in Australia and New Zealand, emphasised that Hollywood is completely conscious of world requirements in motion pictures and stated further that 1938 will herald the dawning of a new and even greater production era.

To substantiate this claim, Mr. Hunter announced that no less than £7,000,000 is involved in Paramount's production schedule for the new season, y This figure reveals an increase 6f approximately £2,500,000 over production costs of. the present season. Mr. Hunter's statement, as reported by Mr. S. H. Craig, general manager of the company in New Zealand, was to the effect that producers are faced with a demand for "bigger" pictures, and Paramount's answer lies in "added production money for a lesser number of pictures." "After a quarter of a century of operation, studio executives have acquired invaluable experience as far as public taste is concerned with the result that we embark 011 our new schedule with complete confidence of achieving even finer artistic development," stated Mr, Hunter. "BOLD AND ORIGINAL." Mr. Adolph Zukor, founder and still chairman of the Board of Directors for Paramount Pictures, is in active charge of all production and in such a capacity his announcement as follows is of exceptional interest to the enter-tainment-loving millions of the world. Mr. Zukor says: "All pictures cannot be big—some are big only in comparison with others, just as it is with all things, but hard-won experience and recent study and survey have given us knowledge of what the public want today. Paramount will produce pictures with vision, boldness, and originality, in the modern technique that will be expected of the' screen in the season ahead of us."

There were forty-two delegates from all the States of Australia and New Zealand in attendance at the Paramount Conference. Among them were Messrs. Stanley H. Craig, New Zealand general' manager; Frank B. Thompson, Auckland representative; J. L. Warren and Reg. Felton, of the Wellington office. Mr. Hunter was attended by the general sales manager, Mr. William Hurworth, and the secre-tary-treasurer, Mr. Jam.es Sixsmith.