Documentary News Letter (1940)

14 DOCUMENTARY NEWS LETTER NOVEMBER 1940 NEW DOCUMENTARY FILMS London Can Take It. Production: G.P.O. Film Unit (M.G.L) Direction: Harry Watt and Humphrey Jennings. Commentary: Quentin Reynolds. Camera: Jonah Jones and Chick Fowle. Distribution: U.S.A. THIS IS a propaganda film. It is also a truthful film. Its major value will be in its showing throughout the American continent, but at the same time it is so accurate in fact and atmosphere that it is bound to have an admirable morale effect on the audiences in this country who see it in its Five-Minute version, Britain Can Take It. The version reviewed here is the full reel as sent to the U.S.A. The film is in the form of a despatch by Quentin Reynolds, war-correspondent to the American journal Collier's Weekly, and of course a United States citizen himself. It is a simple statement about an ordinary London night under the aerial blitzkrieg. It begins in early evening and ends in the morning. The shooting is terse and simple in technique. The photography is of the highest quality, with some really remarkable and highly authentic night scenes, not merely of conflagrations, but also of London illumined by the fitful flashes of gunfire and bomb explosions. The sound track, other than the commentary, is composed of the real sounds — sirens, gunfire, bombs falling and all. It will be seen that, at the least, London Can Take It would be an admirable reportage of fact. That it is so much more is due to the way Reynolds' commentary is welded to the picture, and to the sentiments which the comrnentary expresses (the commentary is published in full on page 6). The style is in the highest tradition of good journalism, while the sentiments stress the absolute and final authority of the people of London as the front-line soldiers of the war, and therefore give the film a democratic validity which is the best possible link between our citizens and the citizens of the new world. The wail of the sirens rings out as a challenge rather than an alarm. And when a sequence of night-raiding ends with the whistle and crash of an H.E. missile, Reynolds' level voice saying "That was a bomb" has a terrific dramatic impact. The facile and facetious last-war "patriotism" of the newsrccls is here shown up for the tosh it is. London Can Take It is the first real message from the British people to the American people. And its effect over here will probably be remarkable. To one person at least, previewing the film after a particularly unpleasant night, it had not merely an emotional quality but also the quality of true courage. It must be added that the production qualities are such that the film shows no sign whatever of the extreme haste with which it was made. Home Front. (Canada at War series.) Production: National Film Board of Canada, Direction: Stanley Hawes. Distribution: M.O.I. Non-T. 10 minutes. Letter from Aldershot, (Canada at War series.) Production: National Film Board and Realist Film Unit. Distribution: M.O.I. Non-T. 10 minutes. THE FIRST thing one notices about both these films is that the Grierson-Legg-Hawes production technique for Canada is concentrating on speed and zingo. Both the films gallop along at a fine pace, and are really beautifully cut — especially Letter from Aldershot. The criticism that they cram too much into a short footage is amply met by the fact that after seeing them one is left with an admirably clear and succinct impression of the information they give. Home Front covers chiefly the role of Canadian women in wartime — including a very impressive female flying instructress. Its technique is roughly that of the March of Time except that it moves much quicker. The women of Canada seem to be taking over practically everything, including many high-grade engineering jobs; and the women of Canada are extremely good looking. Letter from Aldershot was largely shot over here by the Realist Film Unit ; the material was, however, cut in Canada, and a preliminary sequence added showing the departure of the Canadian forces. The commentary of this film is what the title implies — an intimate message to Canada from the boys over in England. There are also a number of direct synchronous sequences, including a series of personal messages spoken straight into the camera by Canadians in England. The film has a very moving human quality, and some of the cutting, particularly that of Canadian Scottish on the march, has qualities which some of us over here would do well to remember. Speed Up and Welfare. Associate Producer: Arthur Elton. Production: Strand. Director: Edgar Anstey. Distribution: M.O.I. Non-T. 10 minutes. THIS IS something real and sensible and vigorous. It is about workers in an aircraft factory, and shows how they organise their defence and their welfare within the framework set up by the various Ministries. The subject is seen clearly and sensibly and is free of the all-too-frequent patronage which creeps in when the operation of Governmental measures for welfare is concerned. The film points out that the hands, the bodies and the lives of the workers are more precious than ever before, and then firmly switches its viewpoint to that of the workers themselves, from whose point of view the story is largely told ("the best judge of industrial fatigue is the worker himself"). There is a fine sequence showing how the factory could turn into an armed fortress at a moment's notice (the people's army springs to life), and the whole film is presented with neatness, skill, and a real understanding of the fundamental decencies. Altogether this is is one of the best and the most enjoyable of the Film Division's non-theatricals. It Comes from Coal. Production: Realist Film Unit, for the Gas Industry. Producer: Edgar Anstey. Director: Paul Fletcher. Distribution: M.O.I. Non.T. 10 minutes. A TEN-MINUTE cssay on the applications of coal derivatives does not sound a promising subject for a film. Yet // Comes from Coal is just that — a tight, succinct essay, neatly constructed, easy to look at and easy to recollect. Anstey, more than any other producer, has the ability to take dry and abstract subjects relating to economics, nutrition and the so-called social sciences, and to put them vividly on the screen. His first film of this kind was The Nutrition Film. To his feeling for clear and human exposition displayed in that film, he has been able to add a directness of expression learned when he was British producer for The March of Time. The result has been that Anstey has developed a special style of his own. If one saw // Comes from Coat without the commentary, the eflect would be baffling: the commentary alone might be flat and dull. Together they blend perfectly and the final result is a logical structure in purely film terms, neither an illustrated commentary, nor a commentary hanging precariously on a series of moving lantern-slide film shots. // Comes from Coal leads us gently from facts about coal itself, to the chemical industry which uses it as a raw material from which to extract or synthesise benzol and plastics, dyestufts and drugs. At the end, one feels that one has been through a lesson, but a lesson so neatly put across, so full of easily assimilable facts, so rounded and clear that one is sorry when it is over. Welfare of the Workers. Production: G.P.O. Film Unit (M.O.I.). Director: Humphrey Jennings. THIS FILM is primarily designed to encourage industrial workers with news of what the Ministry of Labour is doing to safeguard working conditions in war-time. The film is also calc^ulated, with its enthusiastic account of the provisions made for the comfort of trainees, to aid industrial recruitment. The general emphasis is thrown on welfare outside the factories such as the arrangements made to provide good living and recreation for workers transferred from their homes to new jobs