Movie Makers (Jan-Dec 1953)

MOVIE MAKERS 159 let on how, when and where to make and use titles in your movies. Ask for Item J-57. S.O.S. Cinema Supply Corp., 602 West 52nd Street, New York City: A 32 page catalog called Photographic Aids, which itemizes equipment of aid and interest to those using movies in visual education and industry. Film for Red Feather! [Continued from page 156] we intended to picture them. It detailed as well, when needed, any key personnel and properties each sequence might involve. A carbon copy of this shooting schedule was then given to each agency, and it became the liaison duty of the committee to see that it was rigidly adhered to. The fact that our filming did go through without a serious hitch accounted in large part for its ease and efficiency, I am sure. SUBJECT MATTER TREATMENT Within the overall framework of this filming plan, it now devolved on me (the producer) to select varied approaches to the material before us. For if you will check back briefly to Kankakee's community services, you will find as I did that the majority of them work with children or young people. Thus, it was inevitable that they offered a certain amount of duplication in their activities — gym classes, handicrafts, games, dances and the like. So you get around this by arbitrarily apportioning certain activities to one group and excluding them from your coverage of the others. At the Y.M., for example, they actually offered handicrafts; but we filmed the boys at their swimming and gym classes instead. Thus we had handicrafts saved lor the girls at the Y.W., as well as lively scenes of the older girls of working age at lunch and then singing around the piano. In the same manner it was easy to achieve variety in our treatment of the two Scout units: tree planting, setting up camp and artificial respiration for the boys; a simple but moving flag ceremony for the girls — replete with a number of appealing closeups of their sweetly serious faces. Catholic Charities posed a tough one at first, since many of their activities seemed difficult to film. However, we did work out a satisfactory sequence of their child placement service, showing a couple applying at the orphanage for a baby to adopt. The Salvation Army wasn't easy either. But we settled on their services for transients, in which work, here in Kankakee, they substitute for a big city's Travelers Aid Society. As for the U.S.O., the national headquarters loaned us a finished film, and we simply lifted in duplicate two minutes of suitable activities. With the V.F.W., we concentrated on their work with disabled vets, taking our camera right into a neighboring veterans' hospital and bringing back two minutes of sure-fire closeups and near shots. The two Youth Centers were easy and always appealing — outdoors, a picnic followed by a ball game and horseshoes; indoors there were the pingpong and checker tables, the machine shop and crafts room, the juke box. the coke bar and the dancing. THE OVERALL CONTINUITY So much, then, for the subject matter coverage. Undoubtedly you will find both similar and differing opportunities in your own community. But overall you still will need to decide on a continui'y theme to tie this coverage together. In It's Up To You we decided — the committee and I — to tackle directly the two big questions facing every fund drive: (1) Why do we need Red Feather? And (2) where does the money go when I make a gift? To pose these two questions and to present their answers we began by introducing Jim Green, personnel manager for a big industry, and Pete Patterson, one of the many employees in the plant. Green explains to Patterson that Red Feather time is here again, hands him a pamphlet on the Community Chest and asks him personally to sign a pledge card. But Pete is unconvinced. He says he's paying h?avy taxes and everyone he knows is working — so why does the community need Red Feather in the first place? To this Green replies, "Well, let's look around a bit and perhaps we can see why." And with this the film dissolves into a semi-montage of the busy and overflowing city — new factories, new housing, new schools, streets crowded, parking lots filled and the like, as the narrator points up the many needs for social service which the city itself cannot perform. But as we fade back to Green and Patterson, we see again that Pete is still unsold. "Okay." he demurs, "but where does my money go if I make a pledge? / can't take care of all those different problems!" And with this Green rises, goes to a big wall chart listing the ten cooperating agencies and. sweeping it with his hand, says: "Pete, that's just the point of Red Feather. You make but one gift, yet it aids equally all of these Chest groups." Then, with a closeup pointer at, say, the Boy Scou's, he concludes: "I want you to look at some of them with me." And thus the continuity proceeds through the ten groups, returning each time to the wall chart for reorientation. Pete Patterson, delighted to learn that so many kids will benefit from his modest gift, is smiling at the end. He signs the pledge card, puvs a Red Feather in get FULL-OF-LIFE INDOOR MOVIES MEDIUM BEAM REFLECTOR G-E PHOTOLAMPS Designed especially for movie making. 40° beam spread is matched to camera coverage. 375watts means four on a single home circuit. Ideal for camera bracket lights. and to see them at their best— G-E PROJECTION LAMPS Use'em in slide or movie projector and be sure to keep a spare handy. Remember . . . G-E Lamps for every photographic purpose GENERAL ELECTRIC