AUTOMATIC CINEMA.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20483, 8 December 1934, Page 28 (Supplement)

AUTOMATIC CINEMA.

Shilling-in-the-slot Box Offices. The automatic cinema is on the way. The idea is to have shilling-in-the slot box offices—or sixpence or halfcrown, according to the seats; automatic projection which does away with the cinema operator; a time switch which will cause doors to open and close according to the will of the proprietor, who, in fact, need not go near the cinema except to collect the money Mr L. J. Briggs, who has been in the film industry for twenty years, has taken out provisional patents in London for the automatic theatre. This, he says, is the first time the idea has been worked out in detail. He said to a correspondent; “This plan abolishes the bulk of the front staff—box-office girls and attendants. A gate allows one patron through at a time when he or she puts the money in the slot. “ When all the seats are full the gate locks itselt, lights a sign announcing that fact, and seals a slot so that no more money can be inserted. “ Then when people pass out of the theatre they go through a gate which acts on the entrance gate, switches off the 4 Seats full ’ sign, and opens the slot. “ It is impossible to put other than the correct coins in the slot. 44 The automatic projector for the film is, I claim, the first practical proposition of its kind. “ Only one projector is needed, and it will run for twenty-four hours a day if necessary, repeating a programme that can vary in duration from ten minutes to three hours. Three miles of film can be loaded in the one projector—and when that has been run it all begins again. “Most cinemas use two projectors. Sometimes a film breaks owing to the strain of passing rapidly through the