The Cine Technician (1939)

is:; T HE (IN E-T E C HN IC I A X Dec -Jan., 1937-8 Cinema Log by KENNETH GORDON We Look Back Ten Years It was ten years ago when the first Film Quota Act was being prepared, and it is interesting to look back and review the industry in those days. In 1926 production had practically erased, the only organisations representing employees in the production Held were the Producers' Association, under the chairmanship of George Pearson and the lion. Secretaryship of Sidney -Morgan. Backing these were 28 producers, including Maurice Elvey, A. E. Coleby of "Call of the Road" lame. Sinclair Hill, George Dewhurst, Jack Raymond, Anthony Asquith (our much beloved President), A. V. Bramble, Tom Bentley, Manning Haynes, Hugh Croise, Guy New all, Cecil Hepworth and the late George Ridgewell. The old Kinema Club, at 9, Gt. Newport Street, banded together the actors, including Victor McLaglen, Teddy Doran (who later became M.P. for South Tottenham), Pat Mannock (Daily Herald screen critic and then a scenarist). Led by George Ridgewell, this band used to hold open-air meetings at Irving's statue in Charing Cross Road and also in Hyde Park in an endeavour to promote interest in the proposed Bill. Technicians were represented by the late Kine Cameraman's Society which had just lost its funds in the Farrow's Bank crash and, as most of its members were out of work, had not a penny lor ;i fight. This Society had no offices, no paid officials and as its President and officers were nearly all in the newsreels, no real sympathy and knowledge of production problems. Still, in spite of this, it managed to do something towards promoting the Act. N.A.T.E. were in those days only dealing with the theatres. There were few studios built as such then. Converted skating rinks, or glass houses, were the order of the day, and the Hackney Road Studio was a converted Gas Retort House. Gaumont's, Shepherds Bush, was a glass house, and so was Ealing, then Barker's. Films were silent, cameras hand-cranked, and there was no "Pan" stock or colour films. Lighting was mostly old type Westminster's or Mercury Vapour Banks with no "spots." Lenses worked at £.3.5 and even i'M.f> and were not colour corrected ; make-up was No. 5 greasepaint, which made the actors appear to have a bad attack of jaundice. On the exhibition side, P.C.T. was the only large circuit, ami Graham Cutts was just designing his supers. In the labs., wooden frames holding 150 feet were in use for development and the stock was dried on revolving drums. Red or orange lights lit the darkrooms and visual inspection for development of both neg. and pos. was the order of the day. Sensitometric control and our old friend "gamma" were unheard of. Wireless still used the crystal and television was only a ventriloquist's dummy's head, revolving lenses, bits of wire and other strange gadgets and a burning enthusiasm in the hands of Baird in a Lean Street back room. Time marches on. In the Street of Adventure Talking to a well-known film columnist in Fleet Street the other night, lie expressed in strong terms his disgust that A.C.T. si hi attempt to ruin "the already ruined British Film Industry" by attempting to limit foreign technicians. Dramatically declaring that "Art" was international, he appeared to ostracise British technicians from international art. no doubt reasoning thai it is essential to have some high-sounding foreign name and to have been trained in some non-existing Continental studio to even light a title card. I suppose we should only blai the British technicians' bad publicity lor a statement such as this. When "Herr von Schnitzell" arrives in England with a blast of trumpets anything he says is published without checking. On the set lie loudly hammers hell out of his British crew of assistants, making them ap] to the crowd on the studio Moor a bunch of "nit-wi1 instead of as is often the case a competent bunch of good scouts pulling a foreign incompetent out ot the mire for the benefit of a British film, and just quietly taking the knocks. You see. my friend the scribe never hears of the foreign technicians' pictures that are deposited on the shelf, bringing in their train great loss to its financiers. V know foreign "Aces" who are not "Duces" and with whom it is a pleasure to work. so. smarting with indignation at this unfair comment on my brother technicians. I read that Jack Warner says during the incoming year, starting next February, two international world-scale productions will be made at tlie Teddington Studios of Warner Bros. First National, for world release in the 137 exchanges under the Company's control. Full programme will be fifteen pictur involving about £400,000. He chose three Teddington productions, "Perfect Crime," "You Live to Learn," and " Mayfair Melody " for American release without reciprocity. Contemplated production will not import technicians from abroad. Mr. Warner expressed his satisfaction witli British ability and quality of production. Warner Bros. will make British pictures in colour, but not at the moment — so which of these two people is right I lea to your imagination. Kinema Exhibition 1937. The exhibition of Kinematography was opened at the R.P.S. by Col. J. T. C. Moore-Brabazon, D.S.O., M.C., M.P., Hon. F.R.P.S., who was during the Great Warhead of the R.A.F. Photographic Section, is a din Kodak's, and also holds No. 1 pilot's certificate for dying issued by the Royal Aero Club. I often met him when filming in St. Moritz, where the Colonel was a great exponent on the "Cresta Run." In his opening remarks, he said the best reproduction of sound was procured by photography and that synthetic sound might be produced to cut the American accent out of films. In a short time our favourite actor will be able to sing a perfect song with a range tar outreaching the finest singer we have ever heard : "the cinema gol into wrong hands in the early days and in my opinion has never got out of them." further, he pointed out that the amateurs in the colour field could beat the 35 mm. pre sional cinematographers owing to the stock that was available. \ number of competition films were shown and in the professional field a very fine 1 1 B. Instructional film