B movie

A B movie is a low-budget, low-budget film. The division of films into two quality-based groupings dates to the earliest days of the film industry and has precursors in the practices of vaudeville theater. But the B movie as we know it today arises out of the distribution methods used by the Hollywood studios in the 1920s and 30s.

The earliest example of a division of movies into A and B categories that I’m aware of was found by Bill Mullins in a classified ad for Edison Films that appeared in the New York Clipper on 16 July 1904. The distinction appears to be based on quality, but exactly how that determination was made is uncertain. The films referenced in the ad are very short, only a few minutes long, of everyday scenes or short vignettes:

EDISON FILMS
Patented and Copyrighted.

Film Supplement No. 215 Contains Descriptions of 65 Attractive Subjects
Class A, 15 Cents Per Ft.        Class B, 12 Cents Per Ft.

The A and B division may have developed out of or been influenced by the vaudeville practice of A and B circuits, differentiated by the quality of the acts. We have this description of the formation of once such divided vaudeville circuit from 12 April 1913, again from the New York Clipper:

The circuit is to be divided into two parts. Class A theatres will include cities of over 50,000 population, which will have one show a week and will be a one week stand. Class B houses will include all cities under 50,000 population, and will be split weeks, having two companies a week. The shows will follow each other in a circle.

Some vaudeville theaters would run films as well as stage acts. Here is an example from Moving Picture World of 20 September 1919 that reflects something closer to what we today understand a B movie to be:

The Lyric will run two acts of vaudeville and what she calls “Class B” pictures. We won’t risk a deluge of letters from press agents by mentioning the stars she cites in this class, but Class A includes those players who are most popular, and the second class those not so popular, but still by no means as inferior as the classification suggests.

The division of A and B movies as we know it today was formalized by the distribution system used by the studios in the 1920s. At the time, before the government broke up their vertical monopolies, the major studios (MGM, Paramount, 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros., and RKO) and the major-minor studios (United Artists, Columbia, and Universal) owned the theaters in which their films were shown in first run. Independent theaters would show films produced by the minor, “Poverty Row,” studios and second-run films from the majors and major-minors.

Films were broken into two classes, A and B. Class A movies were produced by the major and major-minor studios and rented to the theaters on a percentage basis, with the studios taking a cut of the box office. B movies were produced by all the studios and rented to theaters for a flat fee. B movies typically had lower budgets, were shorter in length, and lacked major stars—although B movies from the major and major-minor studios sometimes featured their contract stars. B movies were cheaper to produce, although the absolute cost was relative: a B movie produced by one of the major studios would typically cost more than the most expensive film produced by a minor studio. As a result, B movies gained a reputation for being lower quality. Theaters would often pair an A and a B movie in a double feature, making the classification analogous to the A and B sides of a single music record. 

This formal classification of films into A and B features was first used by the film distribution company V-L-S-E, Inc. in 1915. The company was a joint venture by the “big four” studios of the day, Vitagraph, Lubin, Selig, and Essanay. We see this in the announcement of V-L-S-E’s classification system in the 19 June 1915 edition of Moving Picture World:

Briefly, "The Big Four" are classifying their productions; they say that while each feature on their program represents the utmost allowed by the subject in dramatic values, artistic photography and construction, some plays do not register in their estimation, as high as others and such subjects, while they must be plays of superior merit to get a place on the V-L-S-E program, are rated as Class B.

Class B subjects will have a lower rental valuation. A maximum charge is placed upon them and no representative of the V-L-S-B will be permitted to accept a higher rental, no matter how strong the competition for service may be in Iiis territory.

This method of doing business is unusual in the film industry, and its inauguration by the four standard companies, establishes it as a permanent part of the business.

This classification system was carried over into studio system that developed in the 1920s. Here is an example that uses the term to refer to the independent theaters that showed B movies. From the Des Moines Register of 2 September 1930:

OTTUMWA—Announcement of the sale of operating rights of the Square and Empire Theaters of this city to the Public corporation of Iowa, subsidiary of the National Paramount Publix, has been made by Stephen Braun, former owner and manager. The contract involves a twenty-year lease and Emerson, who has recently been manager of class B movie houses operated by Publix in Des Moines, will be resident manager of the local theaters. Both houses will be redecorated and a talkie machine will be installed in the Empire, which up to the present time has been without this equipment, thus bringing the total of talkie houses in Ottumwa to five.

And there is this use the phrase to refer to a film itself that I have found is from the New York Post of 25 August 1936 and pertains to Columbia’s (a major-minor studio) film Two-Fisted Gentleman:

In the lineup, besides the principals, are George McKay, Thurston Hall, Gene Morgan, Paul Guilfoyle and Harry Tyler. It’s what the Columbia executives call a Class B movie.

But B movie has persisted as a designator of a cheap, low-quality movie long after the old studio system and the distribution methods were relegated to the dustbin of history.

Sources:

“How Dolly Spurr Announces the Coming Seasons Plans.” Moving Picture World, 20 September 1919, 1851/1. Archive.org.

“Edison Films” (classified ad). New York Clipper, 2 July 1904, 439/1. Archive.org.

Mullins, Bill. “B movie (1930),” ADS-L, 14 December 2024.

“New Theatrical Circuit Formed.” New York Clipper, 12 April 1913, 8/2. Archive.org.

“Publix Corporation Will Operate Two Ottumwa Theaters.” Des Moines Register (Iowa), 2 September 1930, 11/2. ProQuest Historical Newspapers.

Rogers, Maureen. “Remaking the B Film in 1940s Hollywood: Producers Releasing Corporation and the Poverty Row Programmer.” Film History, 29.2, Summer 2017, 138–64 at 141. JSTOR.

“Screen Views and News: ‘Two-Fisted Gentleman’ Just Another Fight Film.” New York Post, 25 August 1936, 11/2. Readex: America’s Historical Newspapers.

Taves, Brian. “The B Film: Hollywood’s Other Half.” In Grand Design: Hollywood as a Modern Business Enterprise: 1930–1939, Tino Balio, ed. History of the American Cinema 5. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1993, 313–50 at 314.

Zimmer, Ben. “‘B movie’ and related terms.” ADS-L, 19 May 2024.

Image credit: Columbia Pictures, 1936. Wikipedia. Fair use of a copyrighted image to illustrate the topic under discussion.