Newsreels and Documentaries
From 1904 until 1967, when television finally killed them off, films were preceded by newsreels. In the early sound film era, they lasted around eight minutes, and featured highlights and clips of the world's biggest stories. They were updated twice a week by the five major studios, and became a highly profitable enterprise; in 1933, newsreels had a total box office take of almost $19.5 million against an outlay of under $10 million. The sound film era created the narrator, among the first was Graham McNamee, who provided voice over during the clips, often delivering hackneyed jokes while delineating the on-screen action. Sound newsreel interviews and monologues featured famous subjects unaccustomed to the new medium. These clips changed public perception of important historical figures depending on their elocution, the sound of their previously unheard voices, and their composure in front of the camera. Soon, around 12 "newsreel theaters" were created around the United States, the most successful being the Embassy Newsreel Theater on Broadway. The Embassy was a 578-seat facility that presented fourteen 45–50 minute programs a day, running from 10 in the morning until midnight. It was noted for its discerning, intellectual audience, many of whom did not attend motion picture theaters.
The most gripping news story of the Pre-Code era was the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby on the evening of March 1, 1932. As the child was already enormously famous before the kidnapping, the event created a media circus, with news coverage more intense than anything since World War I. Newsreels featuring private family photos of the child (the first time private pictures had been "conscripted for public service"), asked spectators to report any sight of him. On May 12, 1932, the child's body was found less than five miles the Lindberghs' home. Although newsreels covered the most important topics of the day, they also presented human-interest stories (such as the immensely popular coverage of the Dionne quintuplets), and entertainment news, at times in greater detail than more pressing political and social matters.
Some of the images' impact belies their historical accuracy; nearly all ceremonies and public events that were filmed for newsreels in the early sound era were staged, and in some cases even reenacted. In one instance when FDR signed an important bill, a member of his cabinet was called away before the staged reenactment began, so the video shows him absent at the time of the signing, even though he had been present. The newsreels of FDR were staged to hide his hobbled gait caused by polio. Caught between the desire to present accurate hard-hitting news stories and the need to keep an audience in the mood for the upcoming entertainment, newsreels often soft-pedaled the difficulties Americans faced during the early years of the Great Depression. FDR in particular received favorable treatment from Hollywood, with all five of the majors producing pro-FDR shorts by late 1933. These shorts featured some of the studios' lesser contract talent extolling the virtues of FDR created government and social programs. Roosevelt himself was a natural before the camera. The newsreels were instrumental to the success of his initial campaign, and his enduring popularity while in office. He was described by Variety as the "Barrymore of the Capital".
Taking advantage of the existence of thirty years of newsreels archives were filmmakers who made early sound era documentaries. World War I was a popular topic of these pictures and spawned the following documentaries; The Big Drive (1933), World in Revolt (1933), This is America (1933), and Hell's Holiday (1933). The most prescient Pre-Code WWI documentary was aptly called The First World War (1934). The most critically and commercially successful documentary of the era, the film is presented in eleven chapters, much like a book. The picture combined a multitude of new motion picture techniques such as commentative music, voice-over narration, and slow-motion photography with a sense of when to speak for the images on screen and when to allow the images to speak for themselves. The New York Times described it as "a memorable and infinitely important document which should be distributed in every civilized country."
Filmmakers also made feature length documentaries that covered the dark recesses of the globe including the Amazon Rainforest, Native American settlements, the Pacific Islands, and most everywhere in between. Taking advantage of audiences voyeuristic impulses, aided by the allowance of nudity in tribal documentaries, the filming of lands untouched by modernity, and the presentation of locales never before filmed, these movies placated Depression era American audiences by showing them lifestyles more difficult than their own. Also captured were Arctic expeditions in films such 90° South and With Byrd at the South Pole, and deepest Africa in the safari films of Martin and Osa Johnson, among others. Some exploitation style documentaries purported to show actual events but were instead staged, elaborate ruses. The most prominent of which was Ingagi (1931), a film which claimed to show a ritual where African women were given over to gorillas as sex slaves, but instead was mostly filmed in Los Angeles using local blacks in place of natives. Douglas Fairbanks mocked the phoniness of many Pre-Code documentaries in his parody Around the World in 80 Minutes with Douglas Fairbanks, in one scene of which he filmed himself wrestling a stuffed tiger doll, then a tiger skin rug. Opposing these films was the travelogue which was shown before features and served as a short saccharine form of cinematic tourism.
Read more about this topic: Pre-Code Hollywood