Amateur Movie Makers (Dec 1926-Dec 1927)

Amateur Cinema League A Close Up WITH this first issue of our magazine a nebulous idea becomes a tangible reality. Amateur cinematography becomes organized. Instead of thousands of us blundering along independently, groping our way without advice or assistance, and wasting effort and money, we have in the pages of our magazine a common meeting place where we may exchange knowledge. Amateur cinematography is a new art. It is different from every other art that was ever developed. A great deal has to be learned because the possibilities are as yet unplumbed. We know but a very little about it but all of us together represent a large total of experience and knowledge. By organizing ourselves, the knowledge of the whole becomes available to the individual. Amateur cinematography has a future that the most imaginative of us would be totally incapable of estimating. When we analyze amateur cinematography we find it a very much broader affair than appears upon the surface. Instead of its being a form of light individual amusement, it really is an entirely new method of communication. Our civilization offers us today, only the spoken word or the written word, as a means of communicating with each other. This word may be spoken to those within sound of our voice, telephoned over a hired wire, mailed in a letter or telegraphed in dots and dashes. But no matter how transmitted it is still the spoken or written word. We are dumb as far as communicating such things as movement, action, grace, beauty and all that depends upon these things. The motion picture communicates all of these. We are able to transmit what our eyes see, and it is the next thing to actually being present ourselves. And so, instead of amateur cinematography being merely a means of individual amusement, we have in it a means of communicating a new form of knowledge to our fellow beings, — be where they may upon the earth's surface. An amateur cinematographer in the tropics may convey to an amateur in a cold country precisely what life in the tropics is, and convey to him exact knowledge that is not only vital, but cannot possibly be conveyed in any other way. Interesting customs in one country which are indescribable in words, and may possibly be of great importance to know, may be made known to peoples of other countries. Every action that occurs, no matter how far away, may be accurately shown in one's own home under conditions of deliberation, convenience and comfort. It may not be too much to say that the organizing of amateur cinematography marks one of the greatest advances in general human education that has been made in modern times. The professional cinema cannot do this in the perfect way that the amateur cinema can. Professional pictures must appeal to mass interest and mass interest does not always embrace the things that ought to be known. On the other hand, the amateur has no necessity for appealing to mass interest. He is free to reproduce and record any action his fancy or the fancy of a friend may dictate. These great possibilities, however, are dependent upon one thing. That thing is ORGANIZATION. Unless we join hands in one central organization, we are not getting out of amateur cinematography even a small bit of what it contains. Organization will place the cinema amateurs of the world in communication with each other at once, and all that the entire world possesses is available to each one of us. These ideals and hopes have been what has animated some of us to put our Amateur Cinema League into being. It is a purely altruistic organization and if we continue as we have started, it shall never under any circumstances serve any selfish purpose. Those who have organized it have given of their money and their time with no thought of any financial return. They are satisfied if our League succeeds in its purpose, and if it shall prove to be a help in bringing men and women generally to a better knowledge of each other. It is not probable that our Amateur Cinema League will hold meetings, conventions and functions of that type, but if groups decide to hold informal gatherings, every effort will be made to assist them. Instead, it is the belief of the organizers that the amateur cinematographers of the. world should maintain a membership in a central organization. Such an organization would make possible a magazine in which we may all foregather to our mutual advantage. Therefore, to be a party to this fine thing, all that is necessary is for every amateur to become a member. The rest will take care of itself, and the writer is firmly of the belief that every one of us will some day be very proud of the effort we have made in organizing amateur cinematography. W-\_j^_£*k_A_*_^-. Q _i Seven