British Kinematography (1950)

188 BRITISH KINEMATOGRAPHY Vol. 16, No. 6 chief, and he translated it into Eteso for the benefit of the actors. Any breakdowns in this rather tenuous link only revealed themselves when shooting commenced. It was more than disconcerting to find upon starting a scene your principal character, instead of coming to the camera, mounting a bicycle and setting off in the opposite direction. What an audience brings to the film is of no less importance than what the film brings to the audience. This raises a difficulty to which there seems no ready solution other than reliable data on audience reaction. Two audiences sit in judgment upon our films. One audience is composed of Europeans or educated Africans who bring to the films their own experience of film going. Is it to be wondered at that so often they fail to understand why tempo must be slower, why action cannot be short-circuited ? The other audience is the illiterate who still says, " There is a chicken " and " Why don't they leave it on longer?" Time will close this gap, and in those places where films have been used extensively and continuously for a number of years, 1910 may well give way to 1950 with increasing rapidity. As a result of audience reaction tests to a Disney health film we introduced a moving diagram into a film of cattle breeding, in order to show increases in milk yield. Whether this will be understood remains to be seen. All these films were made with the aid of a Bolex H.16 camera with the standard set of lenses ordinarily sold with the camera. Other accessories were a geared-head tripod of substantial proportions, reflectors, and exposure meter, and actors found on location. Providing existing lighting conditions were reasonable we accepted them. Films from other Sources Is it possible to use films made for other audiences in other countries ? It would seem to depend entirely upon what they are about. If the subject matter is within the experience of the audience and the film is simple and direct, the answer seems to be " yes." African locomotive drivers of coal burning engines might well profit from a film such as " Little and Often " concerned with the correct firing of an engine. In Nigeria we tried out films on the internal combustion engine with staff employed by the motor section of the Public Works Department, and the Shell films on aviation with mechanics of West African Airways. Properly used, we were convinced they had value, but of course such audiences are limited in number. Even a cartoon film may make its point. This was amply borne out in an experiment with Disney's " Hookworm." The Africans to whom this film were shown accepted it as long as it remained reasonably normal in its approach. The final sequences where a spade appears out of the sky, a hole is dug in a single whirl of movement, etc., were quite beyond them and put down to white man's magic. We felt the success of the film, a 100 per cent, turn-out for treatment, was due to previous knowledge of the subject which the film vitalised, and the additional fact that although the film was made for South America, hookworm symptoms, life cycle, and cure are the same wherever the disease is found. We started with the question, films for Africans, 1910 or 1950? Perhaps this is not the right question to ask ; it implies concern with means rather than with ends. Once we have decided what place films have to take, with other visual aids, in the mass education of the African, we shall not be tempted to worship the false gods of technique. Any technique is permissible provided it achieves the desired end within the finances available, but my own inclination is to follow present theories until such time as they prove false or outmoded, and these theories are nearer 1910 than 1950. The paper was illustrated by the projection of sequences from three films : " No Tax, no Improvement," " Trees are Cash " (both C.F.U.) and " Hookworm " (Walt Disney).