"Shorebirds, waterfowl and other birds of BC." (BC Archives)
This film appears to have been produced during the years 1944 to 1952.
"The evolution and variety of reptiles, including tortoises, snakes and lizards." (BC Archives)
"Here, in Duck Soup, is the true life blood of amateur movie making — the family film. Since the hobby's very beginning in 1923, and consistently through the years since that time, more persons have bought more amateur movie cameras to take family films than for all other reasons put together. And yet look at the results! Or better still, don't look at them — for they are on the average an incoherent hodgepodge of over and underexposure, unsteady camera handling and wild panning on disconnected mementos of familiar milestones. Duck Soup, for those filmers who are lucky enough to see it, should change all that. For here is a well planned and crisply executed family film which has a beginning, a middle and an end. It has also precise camera work, fluid sequencing, and lighting on the children which will delight the heart of all home filmers. Do not, however, let these disciplined excellencies mislead you. For, above all else, Duck Soup is no stodgy exercise in family record keeping. These people had fun! Look . . . Duck Soup is a rollicking, rambunctious saga of what happens in a household when Pop, charging recklessly that the trials of homekeeping are "duck soup," is deserted for a few days by his deserving wife. What happens, as Pop gets the works from a quintet of utterly engaging youngsters, shouldn't happen (as they say) to a dog. There is stolid, well-meaning Tim, who, returning from the corner store, mangles a loaf of bread beyond all human use; there is demure and lovely Ellen, who plays the bride with Mom's best lace tablecloth; there are Greg and Kevin, impish and angelic twins, who roughhouse their way through the afternoon nap, bathing, haircuts and countless other high-spirited adventures. And there is, finally, Gary, the baby, who bawls like a foghorn and is Pop's particular problem-of-the-day. Duck Soup, in recounting these hilarious misadventures, is not a "great" film in the majestic sense of the word. (Majesty would be impossible in the face of that Lawler brood!) But it is family filming of the finest sort. It is warm, winning and alive with good spirits. Duck Soup is the best of the Ten Best for 1952 — and it richly deserves the Maxim Memorial Award which it has won." Movie Makers, 1952, 323-324.
"Trim, tightly knit and altogether engaging, Backyard Birding presents, with affectionate attention to detail, a nature-loving father and his small son searching out the common and uncommon birds of their New England neighborhood. The film's pleasant music and informed but unassuming narrative are in sympathetic harmony with the pictorial whole. In it, with apparent purpose, Herbert D. Shumway has employed a cloudy-bright lighting throughout. Thus, the countless closeups of his bird neighbors, as they build their nests and rear their young, are in soft, true and unshadowed color — as so befits the film's gentle theme. And, just in case you're wondering, these superb scenes (on 8mm. film, remember) are beautifully sharp, despite the wider lens apertures which must have been used." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 324, 337.
"Bulbs and Beauty reveals in painstaking detail the planting, cultivating and harvesting of gladioli in the vast fields surrounding the town of Momence in the state of Illinois. In this elaborate undertaking, Haven Trecker unfolds in well planned and profusely close-upped sequences the many colorful aspects of this popular plant in the life of flower-loving America. The harvesting sequence is followed by somewhat generous footage of a flower festival, the big annual affair in glad-minded Momence; and the festival in turn is followed by a seemingly endless parade in tribute to these bounteous blossoms. Bulbs and Beauty, accompanied agreeably by magnetic sound on film, appears to have been made for informative and record purposes. It fulfills these functions in a lively and competent manner." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 337, 339.
"Featuring a philandering wife, an illicit lover and a trusting husband, Olvido (Oblivion) proves once again, in the course of its sharply paced sequences, that the wages of sin is death. In it, the taut situations (which will lead at the last to murder and suicide) are so expertly directed and suavely acted that they develop always within the bounds of credibility. This achievement is especially noteworthy in an amateur photoplay of this melodramatic type. For others, attempting work in the same medium, have lapsed all too often into either the ridiculous or the farcical. Producers Oscar J. Bonello and Roberto Robertie, both officers of the Cine Club Argentino, in Buenos Aires, have used black and white film wisely, since its stark contrasts under low-key lighting are more effective than would be those of color. The Spanish sound track, employed sparingly and with dramatic force, is in keeping with the high standards of the rest of the picture." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 339.
"Long a chef du cinema of pleasant family films concocted with a comedy flavor, George Valentine, has once again stirred up his favorite recipe. Outsmarted Smarties is a lively tale of a couple of mischievous husbands being outwitted by their wives. In his film, Mr. Valentine has combined clear plot structure, good cutting and sparkling lighting (especially in the interior scenes), to tie up a neat package with a punch ending. The acting is consistent with the demands of the story, and the attractive titles are intelligently inserted only where they are needed." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 339.
"At the outset of amateur movies' newest medium, magnetic sound on film, Robert G. Williams has accomplished a tour de force with his uncannily perfect synchrony of music to pictures in Poet and Peasant. As Kathryn Williams plays the familiar overture on the Hammond organ, the sound accompaniment matches the hand movements on screen without faltering and without once resorting to tricks or short cuts. Countless closeups of the organist's hands as they play give evidence of Mr. Williams's confidence and ability in the new field. But Mr. Williams also has made a lively and interesting picture from a subject usually so dull and static that, more often than not, it has stumped most professionals. Pacing his film with precision, he has used an amazing variety of camera angles, even shooting from above and behind the organ. Mrs. Williams's playing is competent and assured; but it is Mr. Williams's unusually good filming and recording techniques which bring her abilities vividly to life on screen." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 339.
"A teen-aged girl — whose imagination has been excited by murder headlines in the local paper — and a mysterious new boarder in her mother's home are the ingredients of The Man With The Box, a superlative melodrama by James L. Watson. For here is as hair-raising a thriller as you could want to see. Mr. Watson tells his story through the interplay of image and counterimage, without benefit of dialog, and he tells it simply and well. Taut and well paced, the film should hold any audience in suspense-filled excitement from its quiet and clearly stated beginning right up to the shock of its logical and terrifying conclusion. The small cast has been cunningly chosen and wisely directed. The players, Cathy Moss as the inquisitive young girl and John Dowell as the strange boarder, give restrained yet moving performances, sustaining the film's mood admirably. The accompanying score not only complements the story line: it becomes, excitingly, an integral part of it. The Man With The Box returns to the first principles of the silent cinema with rewarding vitality." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 399-400.
"Terry Manos is one New Yorker who has outdone himself (and all other native or visiting filmers) in recording on film the glittering surface of the world's greatest metropolis and America's premier tourist attraction. For The $24 Purchase is authoritatively stamped with the unfailing precision of the Manos technique, the perfection of his lighting and exposures, the beauty and balance of his compositions. Accompanying it is a musical score (admirably recorded) that is generally fresh and germane to the subject, a narrative that (although burdened unduly by the factual trivia of the tourist barker) is delivered with professional skill. In other words, here is a superb visual document. But a document only. For The $24 Purchase records only that surface city which the eye may see. Missing from its makeup are the searching, individual comments on that city of one human mind. Missing also — and perhaps more importantly — are the evocative emotions of one human heart, a heart reacting freely and unafraid of emotion to Manhattan's towers and tenements, to her opulent splendor and her economic ghettos. The film — tragically, if you will — has omitted any message. And, perhaps only by the margin of this omission, it has missed greatness as well." Movie Makers, Dec. 1952, 340.
Total Pages: 299
Amateur Cinema