Synopses & Reviews
By exploring the use of film in mid-twentieth-century institutions, including libraries, museums, classrooms, and professional organizations, the essays in
Useful Cinema show how moving images became an ordinary feature of American life. In venues such as factories and community halls, people encountered industrial, educational, training, advertising, and other types of andldquo;useful cinema.andrdquo; Screening these films transformed unlikely spaces, conveyed ideas, and produced subjects in the service of public and private aims. Such functional motion pictures helped to shape common sense about cinemaandrsquo;s place in contemporary life. Whether measured in terms of the number of films shown, the size of audiences, or the economic activity generated, the andldquo;non-theatrical sectorandrdquo; was a substantial and enduring parallel to the more spectacular realm of commercial film. In
Useful Cinema, scholars examine organizations such as UNESCO, the YMCA, the Amateur Cinema League, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They also consider film exhibition sites in schools, businesses, and industries. As they expand understanding of this
other American cinema, the contributors challenge preconceived notions about what cinema is.
Contributors. Charles R. Acland, Joseph Clark, Zoandeuml; Druick, Ronald Walter Greene, Alison Griffiths, Stephen Groening, Jennifer Horne, Kirsten Ostherr, Eric Smoodin, Charles Tepperman, Gregory A. Waller, Haidee Wasson. Michael Zryd
Review
andldquo;Education is commonly understood as opposed to entertainment. But this rich and fascinating volume puts the lie to such an assumption. It shows how, across the decades, andlsquo;useful cinemaandrsquo; was measured in relation to Hollywood entertainment and indeed interacted with it in a complex fashion. Useful Cinema does so through essays that are themselves compelling and captivating, eloquent and enjoyable. The book is itself, in other words, a masterful blend of the entertaining and the useful.andrdquo;andmdash;Dana Polan, New York University
Review
andldquo;This valuable book reveals how moving images proliferated beyond the spectacular confines of theaters to become deeply embedded in everyday life, cultures, and institutions. The publication of this fascinating anthology is a welcome sign that film historians are starting to forgo their longtime fascination with mass-produced glamour and make peace with cinemaandrsquo;s most utilitarian, and numerically dominant, genres.andrdquo;andmdash;Rick Prelinger, founder of Prelinger Archives
Review
andldquo;[T]he 13 case studies nicely illustrate the variety of institutional settings in the US that exploited the cinematic medium to shape thinking, tastes, and behaviors throughout the 20th century. . . . The overall results are engaging, provocative, and useful. Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty/professionals; general readers.andldquo;
Review
andldquo;Charles Acland offers here a complementary (and alternative) history of media engagementandhellip;. provides significant food for thoughtandhellip;. [E]xperimental film serves perhaps an unusual, but still a legitimate, purpose.andrdquo;
Review
andldquo;A wholly solid collection of new research in a blossoming area of study. Each of Useful Cinemaandrsquo;s articles offers unique, substantial, and interesting work that will engage and benefit any scholar even peripherally interested in the socio-cultural and socio-political dimensions of educational or industrial film. . . . As broad as its subject matter may be, the volume is unified by a rigorous standard of archival scholarship, a remarkable tendency to build interest and delight in unexpected topics, and a consistency of accessible writing that clearly illuminates how film and media are used to write and rewrite social histories.andrdquo;
Synopsis
Collection of essays that consider the production and exhibition of non-feature film, from industrial and educational films to screenings at art museums and planetariums.
Synopsis
By exploring the use of film in mid-twentieth-century institutions including libraries, classrooms, and professional organizations, film scholars show how moving images became an ordinary feature of American life.
About the Author
Charles R. Acland is Professor and Concordia University Research Chair in Communication Studies at Concordia University in Montreal. He is the author of Screen Traffic: Movies, Multiplexes, and Global Culture, also published by Duke University Press, and the editor of Residual Media.
Haidee Wasson is Associate Professor in the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema at Concordia University. She is the author of Museum Movies: The Museum of Modern Art and the Birth of Art Cinema and a co-editor of Inventing Film Studies, also published by Duke University Press.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Utility and Cinema / Haidee Wasson and Charles R. Acland 1
1. Celluloid Classrooms
andquot;What a Power for Education!andquot;: The Cinema and Sites of Learning in the 1930s / Eric Smoodin 17
andquot;We Can See Ourselves as Others See Usandquot;: Women Workers and Western Union's Training Films in the 1920s / Stephen Groening 34
Hollywood's Educators: Mark May and Teaching Film Custodians / Charles R. Acland 59
UNESCO, Film, and Education: Mediating Postwar Paradigms of Communications / Zoand#235; Druick 81
Health Films, Cold War, and the Production of Patriotic Audiences: The Body Fights Bacteria (1948) / Kirsten Ostherr 103
2. Civic Circuits
Projecting the Promise of 16mm, 1935and#8211;45 / Gregory A. Waller 125
A History Long Overdue: The Public Library and Motion Pictures / Jennifer Horne 149
Big, Fast Museums / Small, Slow Movies: Film, Scale, and the Art Musuem / Haidee Wasson 178
Pastoral Exhibition: The YMCA Motion Picture Bureau and the Transition to 16mm, 1928and#8211;39 / Ronald Walter Greene 205
andquot;A Moving Picture of the Heavensandquot;: The Planetarium Space Show as Useful Cinema / Alison Griffiths 230
3. Making Useful Films
Double Vision: World War II, Racial Uplift, and the All-American Newsreel's Pedagogical Address / Joseph Clark 263
Mechanical Craftsmanship: Amateurs Making Practical Films / Charles Tepperman 289
Experimental Film as Useless Cinema / Michael Zyrd 315
Filmography 337
Bibliography 343
About the Contributors 365
Index 369