S.M/S WARNING TO MOVIE MANAGERS

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 103, 22 July 1927, Page 1

S.M/S WARNING TO MOVIE MANAGERS

REGULATIONS NEGLECTED “HPHESE cases will serve as a warning to picture-theatre proprietors, and remind them that the regulations must be observed. Light fines now must not be taken as a precedent for the future,” said Mr. W. R. McKean, S.M., in the Police Court to-day. Alfred Brown, of the Bridgeway Theatre, Takapuna, pleaded guilty to keeping a store of cinematograph film, a dangerous commodity, and to having I a projection room which failed to comply with the regulations. Mr. Girling-Butcher, inspector of explosives, who prosecuted, said that the regulations demanded that the projection room should be built in such a way that a fire in it would be isolated from the main building. The projection room at the Bridgeway Theatre did not comply with this condition. Mr. Haigh, who appeared for the defendant, said that pictures were shown in the hall only on Saturday evenings from 7 p.m. until 10 p.m. After that there was dancing. A TECHNICAL WITNESS Mr. Girling-Butcher said that the Explosives Department was administered from Wellington, and therefore it had been necessary to bring a technical witness from the South. He asked for that witness’s expenses. Mr. Haigh immediately objected to this. Brown was fined 40s on each charge, and the witness was only allowed 10s. The Hippodrome Pictures, Ltd., pleaded guilty to a charge of allowing the cinematograph machines at the Empress Theatre, Newton, to get into an unsatisfactory state. Mr. Girling-Butcher said that the machines mutilated the film, making it risky to use, not only in one theatre, but in the others which would handle the film later. The company was fined 20s.