"Indecisive tells the story of a girl who is rather mixed up and can't decide if it is worth while to go on living. The treatment is unlike most amateur efforts and because of its novel approach the film maintains interest to the end" PSA Journal, Sept. 1965, 50.
"Among the ten best, The Last Entry, running seven reels 16mm., is one of the most ambitious amateur photoplays ever undertaken and completed. The plot, requiring many elaborate interior sets, is based on a mystery story that opens with a house party. While a room is darkened for the projection of amateur films, one of the guests is murdered and all present may be suspected equally. The detective handling the case uncovers the fact that the murdered man, an author, has lived on blackmail effected by threats of exposure through publication, which throws suspicion on several of the guests of the house party who were discovered to be his victims. However, in the end, the murder is solved by screening the same pictures that were on the projector when it was committed. Although this plot offered great difficulties in the direction of large group scenes, the creation of the necessary lighting effects and the interpretation of the actors' roles, it is beautifully and suavely handled. In the film are several lighting treatments that may be listed as among the most effective ever achieved by amateurs. One chase sequence staged through long corridors, a large, dimly lighted attic and on the roof of the mansion at night in the rain, can be likened only to the effects secured in the best professional mystery photoplays. James F. Bell, jr., ACL, was director with Charles H. Bell, ACL, and Benjamin Bull, jr., ACL, cameramen and Lyman Howe, ACL, in charge of lighting." Movie Makers, Dec. 1932, 537-538.
"This picture, telling a dramatic story of a mysterious curse hovering over a stretch of lonely beach, was produced in Kodachrome and runs 400 feet." Movie Makers, Dec. 1939, 614.
"El relato iniciaba con la presentación de un grupo de jóvenes que corren de manera desesperada por las calles de la ciudad, presumiblemente perseguidos por la policía. Inexplicablemente, dada la urgencia de la huída, uno se detiene a escribir en una barda la palabra "Libertad". No lo consigue, porque una bala lo derrumba cuando apenas va en "Libe...". (de ahí el título de la película). [...] La película apenas muestra una esperanza posible en la lucha por la libertad. Después del acoso y el acecho, todos los jóvenes que han protagonizado la historia mueren por una bala anónima de una fuerza represiva que no alcanza a tener un rostro definido" (Vázquez Mantecón, 2012).
"The story began with the presentation of a group of young people that run desperately throughout the city streets, presumably they are being chased by the police. Inexplicably, given the urgency of the escape, one of them stops to write the word "Freedom" on a wall. He fails, because a bullet overthrows him when he has barely written "Freed.." (hence the title of the film). [...] The film barely shows hope for the struggle for freedom. After the harassment and the siege, all the young people that starred the film are murdered by an anonymous bullet of a repressive force that does not have a defined face" (Vázquez Mantecón, 2012).
"David Bradley, the dynamic heart of Willow Films, producers of Macbeth, has behind him a long and amazing record of outstanding dramatic pictures. Among these are his productions of The Christmas Carol and Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens; Emperor Jones, by Eugene O'Neill, and Peer Gynt, by Henrik Ibsen. His Macbeth is the greatest of them all. And in a sense, this moving evocation of the brooding Shakespearian tragedy is the end product of them all — since, in it, Mr. Bradley's creative and cinematic abilities have come fully and splendidly of age. The character of this brilliant achievement may perhaps best be illumined by Mr. Bradley's own words from his plans for the film. "We realized clearly," he has written, "that the strength of our Macbeth must be found in stimulating cinematic treatment, portrayed with such angular camera compositions as to suggest the twisted, supernatural aspects of the drama. We planned our lighting for harsh contrasts and textures, so that, on occasion, the brooding menace of cold, murky stone could almost be felt. For our Macbeth was to be, above all, a movie, depending on atmosphere more than acting, 'punch' more than pomp, for its ultimate success or failure." That it has been success, not failure, is rewardingly the case." Movie Makers, Dec. 1947, 534, 536.
"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.
"Avant-garde surreal film investigating pessimism (embodied by a grey man who tries to commit suicide) and optimism (represented by a joyful young woman and her two children)." (EAFA Database).
"Those who have not attended a New Orleans funeral may look forward to an experience. These are colored funerals for lodge members and important persons. Lodge brothers and sisters dress in their fraternal regalia. Men in uniform, braid, sashes, aprons, plumed hats, swords, long coats. Women in white uniforms or long skirts and complimentary headgear. The choice of dress befits the occasion. The Eureka Brass band Furnishes the music-fast marches to the funeral home, dirges to the cemetery, hymns at the graveside. Leaving the grave, jazz music is played as it is propitious to celebrate, a good time for dancing. Many impromptu dances set up along the return route. to hear the band music is enough to get one to attend a New Orleans funeral. The beat is almost hypnotic" PSA Journal, Oct. 1962, 36.
"Five years before the action of The Old House opens, a young man and his bride of but a year had been involved in a train wreck. The bride, Claire, was killed: but the man — scarred in mind, bruised in body and (he thought) dependent on a walking stick — lived on. He comes now, as the film begins, for one last look at the Old House, "the Old House where I was born and grew up, where Claire and I had been so happy for one short year, with hopes and plans for a future that never came." But, instead of viewing (with self-inflicted sadness) his old homestead, he meets accidentally with a brightfaced boy of five, son of his widowed tenant. How this youngster, this "artless wisdom dressed in blue jeans," frees the man from his stick (a mere surface symbol of his bondage) and from his obsession with the past is the theme of The Old House. But it is fruitless always to attempt a factual outline of any visual study in human relations. And, heartwarmingly, believably and triumphantly, The Old House is simply and exactly that. The producer, Keith Hall, has plotted the course of his tenuous drama with a sure touch and unfailing taste. His scenic progressions are so artful as to seem artless, while his camera work and narrative exposition never fail him in the delicate unfolding of his denouement. Yet it is to the three players of this picture — and to their narrator — that the ultimate tributes must be paid. Young Ross Hall as the Boy, Noela Hall as his widowed Mother, and Mr. Hall himself as the Man are exactly and exquisitely right in their restrained underplaying of three diflicult roles. Reg Cameron, the narrator, speaks lines which are always literate, and often lyric, with warmth and understanding. From its simple opening to its quietly soaring climax, The Old House is a tender and moving triumph." Movie Makers, Dec. 1953, 318-319.
"El paletero cuenta la historia de un vendedor de helados y paletas (Héctor Suárez) que recorre las calles de la ciudad. Es simpático: juega volados con los niños, conversa amistosamente con una criada que ha salido a la calle para hacer el mandado (July Furlong). De pronto un grupo de policías judiciales, vestidos de civil, deciden acosarlo. Se acercan intimidantes a la pareja. Rompen los conos de galletas para helado. El paletero siente pánico y huye por las calles de la ciudad. Es perseguido por los judiciales. Intenta esconderse en las ruinas de una casa abandonada, donde es seguido por uno de los policías. Luchan y el paletero consigue quitarle la pistola. Amenaza al policía y reemprende la huída. Al final encuentra un nuevo escondite en una vecindad. Presa del pánico, el paletero dispara sobre sus perseguidores, hiriendo a dos. Los policías lo ejecutan, y de paso matan a un niño que jugaba en el patio de la vecindad y que había quedado situado en medio del tiroteo" (Vázquez Mantecón, 2012).
El paletero [The popsicle man] tells the story of an ice cream and popsicles seller that goes around the city streets. He is nice: he plays coin toss with children, talks kindly with a maid that has left the house to run some errands. Suddenly a group of policemen, dressed as civilians, decide to harass him. They approach the couple in an intimidating manner. They break the ice cream cones. The popsicle man feels panic and runs away through the city streets. He is chased by policemen. He tries to hide in the ruins of an abandoned house, where he is followed by one of the policemen. They fight and the popsicle man takes his gun. He threatens the policeman and starts running away again. At the end he finds a new hiding spot in a vicinity. Overcome by panic, the popsicle man shoots wounding his persecutors. The policemen execute him, and they also kill a child of the neighborhood that was caught up between the shooting" (Vázquez Mantecón, 2012).
Total Pages: 5
Amateur Cinema