Documentary News Letter (1940)

DOCUMENTARY NEWS LETTER DECEMBER 1940 NEW DOCUMENTARY FILMS Neighbours Under Fire. Production: Strand for M.O.I. Direction: Ralph Bond. Distribution: Theatrical. 5 minutes. MANY AIR-RAID .problems only begin when the bombs have stopped falling. Britain Can Take It told the story of the civilian army which goes into action when the siren sounds the Alert. Neighbours Under Fire portrays the less spectacular heroisms which come later, when the dust has settled and the homeless no longer look back on last night's horror but forward to problems which courage alone will not solve. For a while it is enough to have escaped from the bomb that demolished your home, but when the immediate danger is passed there is food to be found for the family and new shelter from the bombs which will fall again tonight. "Last night my house was hit by a bomb", says a woman in the film and then talks quietly on, her voice hushed by such an unbelievable calamity— "and all the things have gone. What shall I do?" The film presents an answer for her and for other air-raid victims who are shown telling their story with the same simplicity. Patiently, without complaint, they all reveal a touching faith that something will be done for them. The film answers their problem by showing the work of the voluntary services in organising rest-centres and communal meals, in furnishing advice on evacuation and in organising entertainment in the shelters. It is not a complete answer and the film does not pretend it is. But it is clear that the faith of the victims in the power of the authorities to succour them was at first better justified by the voluntary services than by official schemes. The men and women of these services stepped, in the nick of time, into a no less vital breach than did the firemen and the first-aid parties. "As always", says the commentator, "it is the poor who help the poor". Neighbours Under Fire is a five-minute film, but five minutes is not long enough to do justice to this story. Yet the problem is stated, the people are real, their reactions are authentic; and the urgent need for thorough provision to be made for the welfare of air-raid victims who have escaped only with their lives is admirably conveyed by the final shots of homeless shelterers huddled together in fitful sleep underground, while overhead the bombs and guns are beginning again. Ministry of Food Cookery Hints. Oatmeal Porridge; Potatoes: Casserole Cooking; Steaming; Herrings. Production: Verity Films. Direction: Jay Gardner Lewis. Photography: S. D. Onions. Distribution: M.O.I. Non-T. 6 minutes each. WHEN EVERY short production company is working to capacity, and films are delayed for lack of directors, it is good to welcome a new company which can immediately take its place in technical competence alongside other and older established units. The films listed above are the first batch of productions from Verity Films, foimded as recently as last May, though its members are old hands at film making. The aim of Ministry of Food Cookery Hints, to be circulated through the M.O.I, non-theatrical system, is to persuade people to make the best of wartime provisions. Each film in the series is in the form of a demonstration, well directed and photographed and clearly explained. By showing one small group of recipes only and showing them in detail, and by keeping each film short, the complexities which spoil most cookery films have been avoided. And in one case — the boning of a herring — the action is firmly shown a second time, in case one has missed some of the detail in the first viewing. This is a great success, but we suspect that the director lost his nerve after this one repetition, for we should have liked to have seen other repetitions. When something is clearly photographed, clearly directed and worth learning, it is worth seeing twice, or even three times. Such films are important, particularly at the present time, yet they are so humble in intention that they are rarely well made. Verity Films have been sensible in bestowing such care on the present batch, and we hope that the M.O.I, will influence other government departments to follow the Ministry of Food. We should like to see, not only more films on cookery and nutrition, but films on agriculture (in the style of Silage, reviewed in D.N.L. October), hygiene and public health, laundering and dress making, and infant welfare, to mention only a few subjects. An Unrecorded Victory. Production: G.P.O. for the M.O.I. Producer: Cavalcanti. Direction: Humphrey Jennings. Photography: Chick Fowle and Jonah Jones. Music by Liszt. Distribution: T. and Non-T. 2 reels. THERE ARE two Unrecorded victories here; one is the subject of the film, and the other is the fact that the film has at last, after many months of delay, been allowed to reach the public screens (it was originally entitled Spring Offensive). It covers the first year of agricultural England's war, and its story is of the reclaiming of derelict land and the gathering of a harvest therefrom. It is therefore a story equally suitable for times of peace, and this is firmly pointed out by the commentary, at the end of the film, which reminds us not to neglect the people of the land after this war as we did after the war of 19141918. Air Communique. Production: G.P.O. for the M.O.I. Distribution: Theatrical. 5 minutes. THIS IS a neat addition to the Five Minute series, showing how careful the R.A.F. intelligence service is in computing accurate figures of destroyed enemy machines. It is very slickly edited, and the points it makes stick firmly in the mind. Perhaps it is a pity that the day chosen is that on which 185 Germans were shot down; to-day, the computation of a more average bag might be more effective. Still, it will do no harm to remind audiences of the smashing up of the German plan for mass daylight raids, and the film will certainly increase confidence in our informational services and in the types of men who fly our fighters. Britain's R.A.F. Production: March of Time (No. 6, Sixth Year). Distribution: R.K.O., Radio Pictures. Two reels. Britain^s R.A.F. is much better March of Time than some of the recent ones. They have had first class facilities from the Air Ministry and their cameramen have taken advantage of them to turn in some of the best aerial photography for a long time. But even so, and allowing for the fact that the film is intended primarily for the States, it is not really a satisfactory job. It opens with an air battle over Dover, including some sensational shots of barrage balloons being shot down and the A. A. shells bursting round the machines, and then goes on to a review of the Fighter, Bomber and Coastal Commands, passing en route a meeting of the Air Council and the Canadian training scheme. The idea is to give a clear picture of the construction and working of the R.A.F. as well as a bit of excitement and a propaganda boost, but unfortunately the March of Time technique is unequal to the strain. As the hypnotising voice of the commentator booms on, we suddenly find that we have passed from one Command to the next without noticing it, a shot of each Command's badge hardly being sufficient transition. And it is high time they learned that you can't establish facts and figures over shots of youths filing through doorways and such like fiU-ups ; March of Time ought to be above such laziness and sloppy scripting. But where they get down to showing an actual job being done, as in the work of the Coastal Command, the film comes alive, though the emphasis on the Lockheed Hudsons being American seems overstrained. Perhaps American war jitters and their feeling of helpless frustration preclude them from balanced comment on the war. Otherwise they could never have committed the dreadful bloomer of finishing the film with trainees singing, in no very enthusiastic fashion, that mournful dirge "There'll always be an England". {continued on page 9)