The Film Society
The Film Society was an early film club founded in London in October 1925 , which was primarily responsible for showing hard-to-access, foreign or censored film productions of great artistic importance.
history
The Film Society was founded in 1925 by Sidney Bernstein , Ivor Montagu , Adrian Brunel , Iris Barry , Hugh Miller , Walter C. Mycroft and Frank Dobson , all young intellectuals and artists committed to film as a new art form. It was first based in London's New Gallery (1,400 seats) on Regent Street , but soon had to move to the larger Tivoli Theater (2,000-3,000 seats) on the beach due to its success , which was primarily used for commercial film screenings. The Film Society was "the first facility of its kind in the English-speaking world, in which it was possible cinematography to study"
The prelude to the weekly film screenings was made in 1925 by Paul Leni's film Das Wachsfigurenkabinett . Accordingly, it was primarily the silent films of German Expressionism that were shown initially, such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari by Robert Wiene , Dr. Mabuse, the player from Fritz Lang or The Adventures of Prince Achmed from Lotte Reiniger . Later, the focus was more on Russian productions, which were praised primarily for their subjects and innovative assembly techniques and were often subject to censorship, which led to controversial socio-political discussions in London. These films included The Mother of Vsevolod Pudovkin and Battleship Potemkin by Sergei Eisenstein . Eisenstein's first sound film, Alexander Nevsky , became the Film Society's last film to be shown on April 23, 1939.
Eisenstein was a celebrated guest of the Film Society several times at the end of the 1920s, which finally made him go on a trip to Hollywood and Mexico together with Ivor Montagu and Grigori W. Alexandrow in the early 30s .
meaning
The Film Society showed films by Jean Renoir , René Clair , Alberto Cavalcanti , Joris Ivens and Len Lye for the first time in Great Britain . There were a total of 108 evening events, which means that the company can be seen as a groundbreaking source of inspiration for the founding of the British Film Institute .
literature
- Tom Ryall: Alfred Hitchcock And The British Cinema . Athlete Press, London 1996, pp. 10-18 and p. 87 f .
Web links
- The Film Society 1925-1939. A Guide to Collections London: National Library / BFI.