Film Record: Mexican Silhouette

Image from Movie Makers, Dec. 1939, 606.

Date produced: 1939

Filmmaker(s):

Clement K. Chase

Languages:

English

Length:

1200 ft

Format:

16mm

Colour:

B&W

Sound Notes:

Silent

Sound:

Accompanied by a typewritten teacher's guide.

Awards/Recognition:

ACL Ten Best 1939 - Special Class
Eleventh Annual Little Movie Party, 1940

Description:

"Mexican Silhouette, conceived as a gamble, has grown up to glory. After but a few years of average movie making experience, Clement K. Chase — as with so many — felt an irresistible urge to attempt, in one film, a concentration of all his accumulated skill and experience. He turned to a subject he knew with intimacy and affection, and Mexican Silhouette was the result. It is a splendid educational and general interest study, divided flexibly into three main sections — Mexico, D. F., Mexican Agriculture and Mexican Cities. To these subjects, Mr. Chase has brought a mature photographic skill, marked by tripod steadiness, stimulating compositions and a dramatic feeling for the use of filters. Well titled in the original silent version, the film is now being distributed commercially in both sound and silent editions." Movie Makers, Dec. 1939, 633.

Resources:

Discussed by Chase in "What is Mexico?" (Movie Makers, July 1941, 310, 328-330). Film stills are shown and various shooting locations are specified.

Advertised in "Films You'll Want to Show" (Movie Makers, Nov. 1940, 532), which states: "This interesting, cinematic account of Mexican life, customs and scenery was made primarily for educational purposes, and it is accompanied by an explanatory Teacher's Guide. The sequences on agriculture are most carefully planned and show customs originally brought to Mexico from Spain."

Locations:

• Mexico City, Mexico (Filming)
• Cholula, Mexico (Filming)
• Puebla, Mexico (Filming)
• Oaxaca, Mexico (Filming)
• Cuernavaca, Mexico (Filming)
• Taxco, Mexico (Filming)

Subjects:

• Agriculture
• Ethnology
•      Manners and Customs
• Nature
•      Geography
• Settlements
•      Cities and towns
• North America
•      Mexico

Genre:

• Travelogue

Form:

• Short

Screenings:

• Eleventh Annual Little Movie Party, 1940: Barbizon-Plaza Theatre, New York, NY

Viewing Notes:

"An introductory montage on Mexico; Mexico City and environs; Xochimllco, the pyramid of the sun; Chapultepec park, Los remedios; Plowing with oxen; Growing corn; Making tortillas; Tropical agriculture; The burro; Growing wheat; Harvesting wheat; Threshing wheat in a primitive way; Growing onions by irrigation; Hydroelectric plant at Tuxpango; Mexican contrasts; Indian religrious dance; Picking coconuts; Puebla and Its Cathedral; Puebla's market; Colonial architecture; Vera Cruz and harbor scenes; Washing clothes; Taxco." Educational Film Guide, 1949, 600.

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