Film News

*** FILM NEWS *** Feature Film Project The AHA Feature Film project is about to issue its first four programs. Problems with changing technology, copyrights and funding delayed the effort, but the obstacles have been overcome and a September release date is planned. Judging from a preview showing at the Boston convention, the Feature Film project will be a significant contribution to classroom history teaching. The half-hour film cassettes are unique in being supervised by historians, rather than commercial film companies. A book of readings has also been prepared to accompany each program. Computers and Film Research A recent advance in film technology may be useful to historians who work with film sources. According to the New York Times (March 14, 1971) a computerized editing machine will soon be in use by television programmers. Individual frames are numbered and then stored on video tape so that a computer operator can retreive the desired footage simply by instructing the machine. The selected scenes are flashed upon a screen, whereupon the film editor can blend, cut or manipulate without ever touching the original film or even the video tape. Time consuming splicing and laboratory work is avoided, and a substantial saving in time and money is envisioned. For historians, the applications of the computerized editor are suggestive. It might be possible, for instance, to transfer an archive's holdings to video tape, then to the computer, and so make a vast amount of material instantly accessible. The historian could instruct the computer to produce all available footage on, say, Neville Chamberlain, and so avoid the difficult and lengthy viewing now required for archive research. An expensive proposition certainly and one that isn't around the corner, but certainly within the capability of existing technology. British Films Historians in London recently had the opportunity to view films dealing wi-th the activities and personalities of left-wing parties of the 1930 's. The program, organized by the British University Film Committee, was based on films from the significant collection of Stanley Forman and was intended to suggest the possibilities of film sources in the study and writing of modern British history. The screening took place on February 12th, and included comments by Arthur Marwick and Angus Walker. Media and History A meeting on March 26th in Wilmington, sponsored by the University of Delaware, discussed the topic "Media and the Teaching of History." A report on the meeting will appear in a future newsletter. *** BOOK REVIEW *** Jay Leyda, Films Beget Films; pp. 176. Hill and Wang; New York, 1971, $1.75. First published 1964. We owe some measure of appreciation to Hill and Wang for reissuing this important work by Jay Leyda in a low-priced paperback. The book is a unique contribution to the study of films and one especially valuable to historians and social scientists. Leyda discusses the compilation film, that is a work assembled from other existing films (hence the title of the book.) Compilation films are distinguished, although narrowly at times, from documentaries and newsreels by their reliance upon archive collections and historical film. Such works are familiar, especially to television audiences, for much of what passes as history on television is compilation film. Series such as Victory at Sea or Twentieth Century are outstanding examples of the genre. What is vital, however, in compilation films is the skill and attitude of the compiler or producer of the film, for compilations are not merely collections of footage, but statements in film. As Leyda argues, the value of any compilation derives from the intellect and purpose of the filmmaker, who not only studies archive collections but maintains a sensitivity to the meaning and relationship of his sources . Unfortunately, Leyda often allows his political bias to obstruct his critical faculties. He frequently condemns films, for not taking the correct, i.e. , leftist, position. Whatever the reader's political inclination, Leyda' s transparent favoritism and party-lining spoils what is otherwise a frequently intelligent essay on film. For the historian, the value of Leyda 's work lies in its analysis and comment upon the work of film research. The efforts of the film compiler and historian are not far apatt, and much can be...