Filmindia (1941)

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ON THE COVER ASHOK KUMAR Prol>rietors : FILMINDIX PUBLICATIONS Ltd. 104 tpollo Stftet, For), Bombay filmindia VOL. 7 NO. 5 MAY, 1941 Editor: BABURAO PATEL Stop This Tom -Foolery "B' EFORE the Spanish Civil War broke out it was astonishing to note the number of News Reel Theatres which had sprung up in cities like Barcelona and Madrid. There were at least a dozen delightful little modern theatres of this sort in Barcelona alone. You could go, and for the equivalent of two or three pence, have an hour of first-class short films. I think I am right in saying that every one of these News Reel Theatres was controlled by Germans, and that all the news films were of German and Italian origin. It never occurred to the British Foreign Office that the older ways of diplomacy needed to be supplemented by the use of modern inventions. "In short, the thousands of Spaniards who received most of their education as to what was going on in the world through their visits to these places, received the Nazi point of view undiluted by any other", writes John Langdon-Davies in his book "Fifth Column." Here is a splendid idea for war propaganda in our country— an idea which the Film Advisory Board ought to take up immediately and put into execution, if, at all, it is ever to justify its existence. Every effort of the Film Advisory Board so far, to do useful war propaganda has proved abortive. All that the Board has done so far has been to produce some clumsy shorts about the primary training of the soldiers and the sailors and a couple of unconvincing short stories about whispers and propaganda. The soldier and the sailor stories have been so crudely produced and the other "original" stuff has been so much over loaded with the obvious that all these shorts defeat their primary purpose of propaganda. The future subjects in view are equally disappointing with a story about the postal department, another about the transport, one on the industrial progress of India, another on irrigation, one about rowing on the Hooghli, another about a "screw" in the "Steel Frame" of the Government. How amusing is this selection of the subjects? Even a darned fool from the streets can realize the utter futility of these subjects for war propaganda. But the members of the Film Advisory Board don't. And it is a pity. On the other hand, the Films Division of the British Ministry of Information has produced: "Britain At War", the story of a nation's mobilization against invasion; "Channel Incident", picturising the Dunkirk evacuation; "Coastal Defence" showing preparation against attack; "Into The Blue," training air pilots, gunners and observers; "War and Order", on war time duties and training of Police Force and Home Guards; "Job To Be Done", on the use of civilian man power in war time; "Behind The Guns" showing civilians in war work in factories and industries, and many other useful subjects which have « direct bearing on the present war. When one reads the list of war subjects taken by the Ministry of Information in England and compares it with the programme of the Film Advisory Board in India, he is compelled to observe the wide gulf between the objectives and the methods of the two institutions. While the Films Division in London is contributing directly to the nation's war effort, the 3