Documentary News Letter (1944-1945)

DOCUMENTARY NEWS LETTER 99 films for the Ministry of Education. The Institute has no experience of this kind nor will the Governor's proposed Committee provide it. We are not concerned at this stage to elucidate the obscurities and examine in detail the proposed arrangements for distribution through local and Regional Film Libraries and for Regional Staffs to be attached to the Institute. If we were we should like to know whether by "self-supporting" film libraries the Governors mean libraries that restrict their stock and services to what they can provide from the income they receive from film-hire, and if so whether such libraries will meet the needs of schools. We should like to know, too, why the staff and expenditure proposed for each of the Regions is the same, whereas the areas and the number of schools within them vary greatly and so therefore would the size of each library and the amount of work to be done. Greater London and the four North-Western counties, two of the ten "Regions", cover between them almost two-thirds of the population of England. But these things can wait until there is an immediate prospect of films being made and projectors being installed in schools. Neither will result from the proposals put forward by the Governors of the British Film Institute. For our part, we have already formulated what we believe to be the proper method of making and distributing educational films, in The Future of the Educational Film (D.N.L. Vol. V, No. 48). In brief, since the production of educational films must be financed out of public money the Ministry must assume direct responsibility for production and for maintaining proper relations with the local authorities and the teachers. To advise it the Ministry should set up a small and effective Advisory Council on Visual Aids composed of individuals chosen for their knowledge and reputation, with a permanent staff. For carrying out its plans it should work through Films Division of the Ministry of Information or the Film Office which may take its place and thus avail itself of the experience gained there and in the Services. When the Ministry has put this work in hand and also tackled the problems of projectors for schools it should then turn its attention to the British Film Institute. There will be a need for an independent, authoritative body to examine, appraise, and criticise the work the Ministry is doing and to help local authorities and teachers to make the best use of the films and other visual aids produced by the Ministry. The importance of such a body, having behind it the informed opinion of groups all over the country, cannot be over-estimated. It is what the British Film Institute was established to become, and has failed to become, for reasons which are as well-known to the Institute itself as they are to the Ministry of Education. NOTES OF THE MONTH ii Technician or Artist? THE Interim Report of the Technical Standards Committee, published by the Association of Cine-Technicians in August, takes an important step towards combining trade unionism with the I qualities of a professional association or a learned society. Interdepartmental lectures are proposed so that one section of the industry can be led to understand the work of another ; visits are to be arranged to studios and laboratories ; a library of books and films is recommended; most importantly the committee hopes [i that there will presently be a club with premises of its own and facilities for projection. These proposals are admirable, but we feel \\ that they have not gone far enough. In the first place, no attention seems to have been paid to distribution, though distribution is as much a part of film making as production, and A.C.T. members f ought to make themselves familiar with its ramifications. In the : second place the committee seems to regard film technicians mainly as craftsmen rather than as artists and creators. Yet, if our film i industry is to take its place firmly alongside the other great cultural institutions of our country, the film workers will require more than : higher technical standards. They must also put themselves on an equal footing with the leading poets, musicians, architects and painters of the day. It is as important, for example, for film workers p to have an opportunity of hearing T. S. Eliot reading his own poetry, as it is for them to visit Denham Studios. The report does . not mention electricians, carpenters or plasterers. Yet these are as essential to film making as anyone else. The sooner they are encouraged to feel themselves equals beside the laboratory workers, the i production staff and the camera crews, the better. If PostWar Jobs we welcome one of the most important series of films so far i undertaken by the Ministry of Information. The subject of the series is Post-War Jobs and the films are obviously assured of a large and interested audience. The object of each film is to report, factually and without bias either way, on a certain job, and to show what the Ijob is, with notes on conditions of work and future prospects. The | list of projected titles is a long one and ranges from the building trade, via catering, civil engineering, furniture making and the | distributive trades, to office and domestic work. If the Ministry .keeps up the high standard set by the first three, Farm Worker (reviewed in D.N.L. Vol. V, 84th issue, p. 77), Teaching and What's the Next Job?, they will have done one fine post-war job themselves. Films for Parents three Ministry of Health films for parents — Your Children's Teeth (reviewed in our previous issue), Your Cliildren's Eyes and Your Children s Ears (both reviewed in this issue) represent the first serious attempt at presenting detailed medical information to lay audiences. Various home encyclopaedias have been doing it for years but their information is often scrappy and more on the lines of Tom Sawyer's cure for warts, than accurate information that would be helpful to a mother with a sick child. These .three films have not made the fatal mistake of underestimating their audiences; they deal fully with their subject and the pamphlets which go with them will serve as a reminder in a time of trouble. We congratulate the Ministry of Health and hope they will use these films as a basis for a comprehensive series covering the whole field of child health. The King's English the Ministry of Information records films in Chinese and Malay, Spanish and Brazilian, French and Russian, Swedish and Italian, and many other languages. Yet we understand that never, since the beginning of the war, has a single Afrikaans version of an M.O.I. film been available for non-theatrical use in South Africa. America supplies plenty of such films. If the King's English is good enough for Kensington, it's good enough for the Cape, what? D.N.L. Reviews occasionally the suggestion is made that riirn reviews appearing in D.N.L. should be signed. The policy of the Editorial Board is that D.N.L. should maintain a self-critical attitude towards documentary attainments, no less than a readiness to spot-light its successes. This outlook, fundamental to documentary itself, is reflected in the manner of presentation of the film reviews in the News Letter. Commonly a film is reviewed by an individual selected by the Board. By the fact of its being published, unsigned, such a review is endorsed by the Board as being what it considers a valid point of view about that film. Often the review is written by a Board member, in which case clearly it is appropriate that it be unsigned. If a review is signed the implication is that it is an expression of a personal opinion with which the Board does not necessarily wholly associate itself.