"Dr. Numa P. Dunne has accomplished in Colorful Yosemite what hundreds of other amateur movie makers have failed to accomplish — the production of a simple, well planned and charming scenic of Yosemite National Park. Here was a subject selected by scores of itinerant cameramen before him, yet "muffed" almost invariably through lack of care. Dr. Dunne found no scenic advantages in the great park not offered to others, but he obviously brought to the setting something more than the usual confused and slightly awestruck interest. Tripod steady camera work, well rounded sequences, pleasing compositions and imaginative title wordings all contribute to make up a satisfying whole." Movie Makers, 1938, 618.
"First Film and When the Cat's Away, a double header entry, which takes honors jointly because of the strong relationship between the two, is the production of the Cinema Club of Lowell Junior High School, at Long Beach. Calif., and of the club's faculty adviser, Helen Rees Clifford. First Film, largely the work of Miss Clifford, summarizes the Junior High School group's experiences in producing When the Cat's Away, which is entirely the achievement of the youngsters. Together, the two films present a clear and concise picture of the initial production of a film by a junior high school movie club, from scenario writing and movie planning to the completed opus, ready for its premiere. So, in these two reels, one sees how the job of teaching movie making technique to youngsters, of ages from eleven to fourteen, can be handled efficiently and happily, and one learns how clear and coherent a little picture can be produced as a starter. Few high school photoplay clubs have begun so well and with so little lost motion. Very few high school first films are as clear and competent as When the Cat's Away." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 618.
"First Film and When the Cat's Away, a double header entry, which takes honors jointly because of the strong relationship between the two, is the production of the Cinema Club of Lowell Junior High School, at Long Beach. Calif., and of the club's faculty adviser, Helen Rees Clifford. First Film, largely the work of Miss Clifford, summarizes the Junior High School group's experiences in producing When the Cat's Away, which is entirely the achievement of the youngsters. Together, the two films present a clear and concise picture of the initial production of a film by a junior high school movie club, from scenario writing and movie planning to the completed opus, ready for its premiere. So, in these two reels, one sees how the job of teaching movie making technique to youngsters, of ages from eleven to fourteen, can be handled efficiently and happily, and one learns how clear and coherent a little picture can be produced as a starter. Few high school photoplay clubs have begun so well and with so little lost motion. Very few high school first films are as clear and competent as When the Cat's Away." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 618.
"The Glory Road is a film story of flying fists and hard punching youngsters battling their way to the top of the amateur boxing world. It records, with amazing completeness and verity, the actual ring contests of the 1938 Golden Gloves championship fights. Taking up the story at the bottom of the ladder, Dr. Clifford Decker pictures the long grind of training, the whirl of preliminary elimination fights, the trip of a local picked team to New York for the semi finals and the eventual rise of a Binghamton boy to the Eastern championship after a victory in Madison Square Garden. A sizable accomplishment, this film is more than a mere record. The producer has added imagination and has built up a significant continuity with stirring crises. Although the vast bulk of material, necessary to make the document complete, rather overbalances the film and detracts from its pure motion picture value, The Glory Road is an extraordinary picture." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 618-619.
"Opening with a superb trick title in Kodachrome, Guatemalan Rainbow, by the late Ripley W. Bugbee and Robert W. Crowther, carries the audience on an ocean voyage from New York City to the mountain villages of Guatemala, where Mayan mysteries are still celebrated and where the world is a riot of indescribable color. No sequences of the leisure and pleasure of shipboard life have excelled those in this picture. Dexterously, the ritual of afternoon tea was captured with the same finish as if the scenes had been directed in a studio. Active sports and lazy afternoons are recalled in the picture with idyllic beauty. After several minutes of rather less interesting and distinguished footage, the production reaches another high in the presentation of the descendants of the Mayans, whose markets, customs and religious observances are dramatically and expertly chronicled. The whole is accompanied by a satisfactory musical setting." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 619.
"Frances Christeson, experienced cinematographer and artist of cine devices, gives us in Log of the Timber Rush the movie diary of a holiday voyage. That the freighter, in which she had booked passage, stripped its gears and was stalled somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, well off the coast of Mexico, upset her film plan but did not stop her. It became part of an amazing personal and movie making experience. But before the misfortune at sea and the long delay of weeks, waiting for help and repairs. Miss Christeson had filmed the loading of the Timber Rush with affectionate attention to detail and the use of fascinating cine symbols. She also had captured sequences of gorgeous quality, framed through ship's gear and depicting the beautiful, lazy clouds of the tropics and the life aboard the vessel. When the gears were stripped and the long period of inaction came, the camerawoman had, as she puts it, "the job of filming nothing happening." She does that as well as possible, and the result is a delightful sea picture marred only by the doldrums of fate." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 619.
"Charles O. Barr, jr., in Long Remember, has done an extremely difficult thing admirably. This is a Kodachrome record of the recent last meeting of Union and Confederate veterans of the American Civil War on the battlefield of Gettysburg, in Pennsylvania. Because the persons of chief interest, the veterans themselves, were unable to contribute motion to any real extent, Mr. Barr's problem was to avoid using movie footage for still photographs, and yet not to offer an incomplete record of the interesting and historically important gathering. Aided by title wordings that were both dignified and exciting, the maker of this film managed to give to it a sweep of action that, without them, would have bogged down badly. There was motion, of course, in the parades, but these, of themselves, would have been trite fare, had they not been related to the battlefield by shots of watching veterans and by a whole series of admirable angled shots of the statues and markers on Gettysburg field. It is noteworthy that what might have been the dull portions of the record — the construction, housing and victualing arrangements — were given very intelligent, brief handling." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 619-620.
"Charles A. Ferrie, jr., an urban movie maker, has gone back to the land for the beauty and charm of Mother Earth. Here, in carefully filtered and unfailingly well composed shots, he has caught the moist freshness of newly turned soil, the delicate loveliness of waving grain, the quiet dignity of men going about the homely tasks of the farm. His method of subject matter treatment has been to study these things from the outside, as a sensitive spectator, rather than to involve them (and the spectator) in a story told against such backgrounds. Mr. Ferrie's photography is consistently good and often striking, while his sequencing adds much of interest and inspiration to an essentially pastoral subject." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 620.
"The eagerness of a movie maker to use a new cine camera is the clever introduction and leitmotivof Movie Bugs, an exceedingly well photographed picture by Dr. Frederick W. Brock. The picture tells how the movie maker protagonist gets in touch with a science teacher and how the two of them construct a support for the camera for use with it in filming through a microscope. The succeeding shots of hydrae and paramecia and other microscopic organisms are beautifully filmed, and the picture infers the obvious conclusion that any university zoology department should be equipped to make such studies. Clean cut interior lighting and a well knit story distinguish this fine filming job." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 620.
"New England Holiday is the kind of travel film any movie maker should be proud to produce. Replete with human interest and a warm feeling of good fun, this two reel record is distinguished by a wealth of splendid compositions and natural camera treatment. Albert F. Watts has lavished on such typically New England subjects as Gloucester harbor, the fishing fleet or a clam bake the sensitive feeling of an artist for line and mass and the alert understanding of cinematics of a genuine movie maker. Smoothly integrated sequences have been edited with unerring suavity and liveliness, comprising a whole which is both vital and lovely to look at. The production is fundamentally weakened only by a selection of title wordings considerably less spirited and effective than the films which they accompany." Movie Makers, Dec. 1938, 620.
Total Pages: 299
Amateur Cinema