The cinema and the public: a critical analysis of the origin, constitution, and control of the British Film Institute (1934)

Under Condition 3 — that concerning the Institute's governors — the Cinematograph Exhibitors' Association has appointed Mr. T. Ormiston, C.B.E., M.P., their Honorary Treasurer, as one governor ; the Kinematograph Renters' Society has appointed Mr. F. W. Baker, a leading distributor and Managing Director of Butcher's Film Service, as another ; and the Film Group of the Federation of British Industries has appointed Mr. C. M. Woolf, Managing Director of the Gaumont-British Cinema Corporation as a third — three of the most active and experienced leaders in the Industry. Since it is unlikely that any of these three associations will wish to remove any of them from their position as governors of the Institute — and they cannot, by the Articles quoted above, be removed in any other way — their appointments — unlike those of the governors who are supposed to represent " public interests " — must be regarded asy to all intents and purposes, permanent. Contrast the authority and permanent position of these three film trade governors with (a) the doubtful and circumscribed authority, of the three governors appointed by the Educational Commission (which has already gone out of existence), and with (b) the temporary and circumscribed authority of the three who are supposed to represent " public interests " : (a) With regard to the first of these, not even their most fervid admirers would maintain that the three gentlemen in question — Mr. A. C. Cameron, M.C., M.A., Mr. R. S. Lambert, M.A., and Sir Charles Cleland, K.B.E., LL.D., M.V.O.— publicspirited as they are, occupy positions in the great educational world in any way comparable with those occupied by their three film trade colleagues in the cinema industry, or can speak with anything Page 28