"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.
"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.
"The evolution and variety of reptiles, including tortoises, snakes and lizards." (BC Archives)
"Shorebirds, waterfowl and other birds of BC." (BC Archives)
This film appears to have been produced during the years 1944 to 1952.
"Film of members of the Toronto Movie Club filming fruit tree blossoms and scenery at the Woodley family property at West Hill." Library and Archives Canada.
"Film about canoeing, featuring members of the Charles Devenish Woodley family." Library and Archives Canada.
"BC Packers (Western Canadian Whaling Ltd.) whaling operations, based at Coal Harbour in Quatsino Sound. The whaling vessel Polar V leaves on a voyage. Preparation of equipment, including harpoons and harpoon gun. A whale is sighted, pursued and harpooned; it struggles, dies, and is flagged. The onboard scenes continue, showing more harpoon preparation, hunting and killing of whales. Whale is towed to Coal Harbour, where the flensing, butchering and processing of the carcass is shown. The Polar V sets out again; in very rough seas, another whale is pursued and killed. " (BC Archives)
The Western Canada Whaling Company was a sub-division of British Columbia Packers Limited.
The filmmaker is not identified. Film begins with the credit "British Columbia Packers presents..."
"A western, in color, about a drifter looking for work and then falling in love with his employer’s granddaughter." Church History Library.
"It stars a young boy, named Bill, who writes to his friend Jim, reflecting on their times together the previous summer. Title cards of the boy’s handwritten letter are interspersed with images of their summer highlights, including scenes of fishing, automobile stunts of “Bob King and his Devil Drivers,” and a motorcycle hill climb competition." Chicago Film Archives
A Camper and His Canoe was filmed at Camp Kawagama, the youth summer camp run by the filmmaker and his wife.
Total Pages: 299
Amateur Cinema