Business screen magazine (1946)

the camera eye VIEWPOINT AND COMMENTARY BY 0. H. COELLN Happy Holiday Greetings and Let Truth Be Your First Resolve THE FINAL MONTH of a very eventful year is the inevitable time for reflection, especially since '70 was our first away from the big city. And because we've been so close, through the years, to members of the Industrial AudioVisual Association and the Information Film Producers' group out West, the respective, recent meetings and growing strength of these professional A-V organizations cast a warm pleasant glow on the otherwise wintry patterns of December. May all the Christmases of those who serve audiovisuals, with their hearts as well as their minds and skills, be the merriest and may the coming year be as bright and productive. Special greetings to Kodak's honored Gold Medalist, the dean of all who communicate, Jamison Handy — and all those who honored the factual media through their awardwinning efforts. To the Council on International Nontheatrical Events, that tireless (and so little rewarded) group of dedicated volunteers who annually bring together the best of the nation to light the screens of film festivals around the world. And we'll remember, through our own happy holidays deep in the Ozarks, the many who have taken the time to write to us, keeping a deep spot of affection for our suc cessors on the presslines: Bob Seymour, now publisher of Business Screen and Lon Gregory, editor and our active successor in the ranks of lAVA as he has been at IFPA. Our Western tower-ofstrength. Herb Mitchell, has retired from that post but will always have a special place in our heart. When you think about those resolutions for 1971 there is just one which must be uppermost among those who create sponsored films of any length, down to a 10-second television commercial: let truth be your everlasting first principle. Critics of all media have had a field day in recent months, picking apart the exaggerations, the tricks and the turns which all-too-many sponsors and their agents have wrongly felt they needed to sell their wares. The same wise people who resisted those techniques in the recent November election campaigns, where multimillion dollar television commercials lost for their misguided clients in such states as Illinois, for example, are the same consumers we'd better respect with truth and accuracy on the screen. And perhaps there was another memorable lesson in President Nixon's illadvised use of that poorly-conceived "law and order" videotaped speech on election eve. Not only of poor quality in reproduction but heavy-handed in content, that single tape hurt far more than it helped anyone. The people, yes! Can You Define Your Picture's Objective in a Basic, Core Idea? A recent letter from Jack McDougall brought more kudos for our recent "update" on public relations films, also well received at the annual Public Relations Society of America sessions in Atlanta. But Jack also touched a hot button in reminding us that so many of the PR film titles we mentioned had one common denominator: a basic, core idea that shone forth, no matter whether the budget was for hundreds of thousands of dollars or a fraction of that sum. That was the "suc cess factor" behind International Harvester's timeless Man With a Thousand Hands, the substance of that alltime safety picture, Day in Court. So the sponsor who insists that the whole film plan be spelled out to him in a single defining phrase or sentence, can be on the way to achieving something on the screen. For Day in Court, it was: "that split-second which makes the difference between life and death." Masterful film makers like Cap Palmer, Lee Bobker, Nat Zucker and so many others have proven it time and again. And, speaking of safety films, it isn't possible to let a year go by without two more salutations: the first, to the National Committee on Films for Safety, which annually gives our field the benchmark of excellence in films for that vital field; the second, a moment of reminescence for the safety film we'll never forget (and why): Sinclair Oil's famed Miracle in Paradise Valley, produced by Wilding. The Miracle here, which brought tears to the eyes of another hardcase like ourselves, the editor of Country Gentlemen magazine, was not only the result of a sound basic concept but the superlative performance of a former actor-now-turneddirector, Kirby Grant. When somebody produces the long-awaited reel of "best scenes" from sponsored motion pictures through the decades, it will have to include that climax episode in which Kirby faces a jeering town meeting, reminds his neighbors of the incidents which caused empty chairs at this gathering through avoidable farm accidents. Yes, proper casting and full use of the latent power of the fOm to "get inside" our emotions and leave lasting impressions, are other imperatives for sponsors. Kind of hard to do that on a film which calls for fixed focus over a new engine but you get the idea: don't overlook today's crying need to reach the people troubled about pollution, minorities, free enterprise Continued on page 1 7 14 BUSINESS SCREEN