Reel and Slide (Mar-Dec 1918)

REEL and SLIDE 13 Film Records South Sea Cannibalism Martin Johnson Describes Experience in Photographing Savages of South Pacific Fifty Thousand Feet of Negative — Illustrate "Life and Customs" for Students By Martin Johnson (Producer of the Martin Johnson South Sea Island Cannibal Pictures which have attracted the attention of America's leading scientific men, and companion of the late Jack London during his ' voyage on the "Snark.") I traveled 31,000 miles to make 50,000 feet of moving pictures in the last stronghold of cannibalism. ^ I got what I set out to get, though at the risk of my life and only after experiencing many hardships and much suffering, including a journey over the surface of the Southern Pacific in a 22-foot whale boat. These films, a portion of which are being shown in America's leading photoplay houses, are being featured on the programs, described on billboards, pictured in lobbies and advertised in newspapers, and when all is said and done they are simply a unique series of travelogs. I do not usei the word "educationals." Thej' are educational, but were not produced primarily as such. A large part of the fifty-odd reels enable a study to be made of the cannibals of the South Pacific in all the grotesque phases of their community and domestic life ; but I am Martin Johnson. going to return again to this marvelous corner of the world for the sole purpose of filming real educationals that will fully meet the standards of the most conservative and searching student of tropical native life. I saw many things during my sojourn in this bizarre land that I should have liked to preserve for the school rooms of America. But conditions prevented me getting them. They are there and to be gotten ; and I know what they are and where to go for them. I need not dwell on the well-known topography and geographical characteristics of the 400,000 islands in this group of the South Seas. Any good atlas will easily show the thousands of islands that dot the Pacific. And here and there are found tribes of the most primitive types, who now have as neighbors and guardians solitary members of the British Colonial Constabulary — a mere handful of men who police, as best they can, this wilderness of blue water, luxuriant foliage and lurking, man-eating devils who seem to be little above beasts. Film Depicts Daily Life of Cannibals My South Sea Island experience is fortunate in that I got what students have wanted for years, It is true we have had the writings of travelers and students to inform us concerning these wild children of nature, but it has remained for the moving picture to actually depict them in their most intimate daily lives, to visualize for all time their racial customs, social intercourse, methods of warfare, religious beliefs and development. I consider our pictures a worthy augmentation to the textbooks which have been prepared on the subject and the fact that they have attracted considerable attention on the part of the Weird funeral ceremony of the South Sea cannibals. One of the thrilling episodes in Martin Johnson's big series. (RobertsonCole Corporation.)