The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

156 The Industrial Motion Picture The Educational Screen an account of the regular noon-hour film showing in a Philadelphia mill. Hundreds of similar exhibitions are occurring daily in the non-theafrical field. Strange as it may seem, the pictures in such exhibitions are those that are given "thumbs down" by the majority of theatrical patrons. Business, or industrial pictures, as they are commonly called, are being increasingly used by schools, churches and other organizations, to emphasize or illustrate their message. This adaptation, or adoption if you will, shows remarkable versatility in capitalizing these valuable forces. This method of application increases rather than diminishes the message the producer or manufacturer wishes to convey, through his industrial picture. As the commercial entertainment picture stimulates the emotions and serves to appease the demand for tears, laughter, love and hate, so the business picture awakens :he intellect, develops a broader conception of life and of our intricate and complex social system. It creates a harmonious understanding of, and a greater sympathy for, those in other walks of life. These pictures are the silent masterful appeal for the brotherhood of man, and a grim warning and barrier against intolerance by sect or class. During the past five years, industrial pictures have risen from an uninteresting trip through a factory, to productions of real merit. These early pictures were ground out by free-lance and often inexperienced camera men, with the result that they were of little value to either manufacturers or audience. The present day production is built with as much and often greater care and preparation than many of our heralded super-productions. That a business picture designed for a purpose, artistically and skillfully produced, brings the desired results, has been proven over and over again. Its entertainment qualities open the theatre to it, and its educational value creates a demand in the non-theatrical field. During the past year, many of these exceptional business photoplays have been royally received in the theatres. Our Bureau, (The Motion Picture Bureau, Industrial Department of the Y. M. C. A.), but one of a score of distributors, is listing pictures provided by 88 to 100 business concerns of national reputation. The demand for these films is greater than the supply, and convinces one that this type of picture is successful in meeting requirements of the non-theatrical field, namely entertainment and informational, and from the manufacturer's point of view, a direct sales and educational service to the consumer. When boiler-makers request to see how typewriters are made, and churches are presenting, in connection with their Sunday evening services, care of the teeth, production of coal, growing of oranges, etc., and coal miners ask for ''A look-in on the silk industry," one does not have to ask: "Do people want to know about these things?" The present system of production and distribution of entertainment pictures, makes the securing of the comparatively few available films, extremely difficult. (Practically the entire supply of entertainment pictures to the non-theatrical field, is secured through independent non-theatrical exchanges, a service not too bountiful or satisfactory at the present time.) Theatrical exhibitors, fearing that the non-theatrical exhibitions will decrease their business receipts, demand that the distributors refrain from providing any theatrical pictures to non-theatrical exhibitors. On the other hand, the exhibitors are continually being prodded by Committees on Better Films to select higher class pictures, and are seriously handicapped by the methods through which they must book pictures from distributors. Few, if any, exhibitors