International Review of Educational Cinematography (Jan-Dec 1934)

168 THE CINEMA IN EDUCATION fluence on the formation of states of mind, ideas and voluntary acts. There is no question nowadays that the animated projection, by appealing especially to the senses penetrates into the fancy and the heart, implants concepts and impressions in the mind, leaves strong memories and impresses images, forms, precepts and warnings on the mind. We must study therefore what it is best that the cinema should show in order to arrive at certain definite purposes, and also how and where. We must study the projections in order to see in the effect which we wish to attain are efficacious. " A proposal having special reference to the physiological and psychological effects of the motion picture might be : in view of the generally receptive, malleable, excitable, imitative and fantastic nature of children, We could make experimental researches with elaborate means and a scrupulous precision of method on the particular effects which the cinema has on children's minds up to a certain age . (0. N. M. I. Federation, Modena). There is no need to exaggerate. One cannot expect that educational films shall be projected everywhere. Everything must be done in the right place. Nor can we insist that only certain types of picture be made and projected. We must know how to choose arguments and places that are specifically adapted in order to arrive at certain results. We must fix a limit, that of boredom . We must avoid boring and wearying people by insisting on the projection of films which are all right in one place, but unsuitable in another. The matter has therefore a double aspect, regarding the content, and regarding the place and manner of the projection. Let us examine one by one the various forms of film content which interest us in relation to the various forms of education and the special categories of persons for whom such education is intended. There are also the questions referring to the manner and place of the carrying out of the education. Demographic Education. — This is a matter of wide and general importance, and should be understood by all categories of individuals and in view of the demographic situation existing in most countries has a national and international side. There is no need to repeat here what is universally known, that is, that the population drop or demographic decadence manifesting itself in modern nations should be fought with all possible means if we want to safeguard the future of civilization. It is now generally agreed that apart from combating the direct causes of the evil (infantile mortality, lack of hygienic education for the mothers, etc.) the indirec causes should also be fought. These include citycrowding, immorality and diminished respect of the family. The cinema can and must be an extraordinarily efficient instrument for the demographic education of the peoples. It can show with the plastic, fascinating sensitive evidence of the image the deleterious consequences of over-crowding in the cities, stressing at the same time the adavantages both physical and moral of country life. It can exalt the tradition of the family, which is the basis of the national life, and hold up to admiration the offspring as the joy of existence, the fount of honour and of human immortality on earth. We should make it obligatory on all cinemas to project pictures reproducing all the activities undertaken for improving the physical and moral state of the race. Taking into account that it is always easier to instruct when we are also entertaining, we can see the necessity of showing pictures which mingle interesting plots and touching incidents in films containing in a simple way the precepts and laws which should regulate the life of an honest family, even if it be a poor family. We should teach the beauty of health and the affections, the healthiness of Work. We should teach in a practical fashion all those small rules of hygiene and cleanliness which make for health and strength and improve the spirit ".(0. N. M. I. Federation of Agrigento). It may be that we could follow for this purpose some demonstrative criteria of considerable efficacy already utilized by the press such as graphs indicating race decadence, pictures illustrating future of a nation with a dwindling birth rate, plastic images of the results of shrinking births, etc.. We should, in a word, make a strong impression on the spectators'mentality by means of a symbolic documentation of the present and the future. Educating the Mothers. — Women can receive much useful maternity instruction by means of the motion picture. They can be educated spiritually by projections exalting maternity and the family, educated technically in pre-natal and post-natal hygiene. In the first instance, we want general pictures for all types of spectators ; in the second case, specific films for given categories of women (women in various stages of pregnancy, nurses, workwomen, peasant women ; etc.).