Documentary News Letter (1940)

Record Details:

Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

NEWSIITTER CO DOCUIVIENTARY — THE CREATIVE INTERPRETATION OF REALITY VOL 1 No 10 PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY FILM CENTRE 34 SOHO SQUARE LONDON W1 FOURPENCE 1 NOTES OF THE MONTH 3 M.O.I. UNDER FIRE Analysis of the Select Committee's Report 5 NON-THEATRICAL Analysis of the M.O.I. Programme 6 DOCUMENTARY BOOKINGS FOR OCTOBER 7 NEWS FROM OVERSEAS 8 REVIEWS OF M.CJ.I. NON-THEATRICAL FILMS 10 A MINISTER OF BROADCASTING? Capt. Plugge's speech in the Commons 13 THE OTHER CINEMA hv R. S. Miles 14 ROSTER OF ONE YEAR'S PRODUCTION OF SHORT PROPAGANDA FILMS 16 FILM SOCIETY NEWS 17 BOOK REVIEWS 18 FILM CATALOGUES Government Cinematograph Adviser IN THEIR REPORT the Select Committee on National Expenditure records that the experience of the Government Cinematograph Adviser was freely used both in the pre-war planning of the Films Division of the M.O.I, and in the subsequent work of the Division up to the end of December. Since then, and contrary to Treasury instruction, the Sub-Committee reports that he has not been consulted. Commenting upon this an Evening News correspondent states : — "The man whom the Film Section is advised to consult before embarking on future film production is Mr. J. G. Hughes Roberts, a Stationery Office official. He is at present 'seconded' to the Film Section. Soon after the end of the last war the War Office discovered, with some alarm, that it had in its Whitehall cellars many miles of highly-inflammable film, taken on the various battle fronts. No one knew how to keep films safely, so that it was with a good deal of relief that an ex-Salvage Corps officer, Mr. Foxen Cooper, was found in the Stationery Office. He at least knew how to put out fires, and he became custodian of the nation's official films. With enterprise he developed his new charge until he became the Government's film librarian. So it happened that whenever any professional producer wanted to borrow a bit of old war film for incorporation in a new picture, Mr. Foxen Cooper was the oracle who decided for or against permission to borrow the old celluloid. Inevitably, he was consulted on all Whitehall's film problems, and the post of Government Cinematograph Adviser was perpetuated by Mr. Hughes Roberts' succession to Mr. Foxen Cooper. This is the only explanation, I am told by leaders of the film industry, for the peculiar situation of a Stationery Office official being an expert on film matters."