First Motion Picture Unit
During World War II, Laven was assigned to the U.S. Army Air Forces' First Motion Picture Unit, the first unit of the United States military to be made up entirely of motion picture personnel. The unit made training films from 1942–1945 at the old Hal Roach motion picture lot. Laven later recalled that the films they made were not "phony" Hollywood war films: "They had to be approved by the higher-ups in the Air Force. They had to be technically accurate in every possible way." The unit included actors George Montgomery, Arthur Kennedy, Alan Ladd, William Holden, and DeForest Kelley. Army Capt. Ronald Reagan was the unit's personnel officer. Laven recalled that the men liked and respected Reagan, noting, "He was always a very warm, cordial, and pleasant man."
Laven described the First Motion Picture Unit as "the best film school in the world," because participants learned all aspects of the movie industry. He even had the opportunity to work briefly in front of the camera as an extra in the pilot training short, Live and Learn.
Read more about this topic: Arnold Laven
Famous quotes containing the words motion, picture and/or unit:
“The motion picture is like a picture of a lady in a half- piece bathing suit. If she wore a few more clothes, you might be intrigued. If she wore no clothes at all, you might be shocked. But the way it is, you are occupied with noticing that her knees are too bony and that her toenails are too large. The modern film tries too hard to be real. Its techniques of illusion are so perfect that it requires no contribution from the audience but a mouthful of popcorn.”
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)
“But what now grips his fancy is her face,
And how the cunning picture holds her still
At just that smiling instant when her soul,
Grown sweetly faint, and swept beyond control,
Consents to his inexorable will.”
—Richard Wilbur (b. 1921)
“During the Suffragette revolt of 1913 I ... [urged] that what was needed was not the vote, but a constitutional amendment enacting that all representative bodies shall consist of women and men in equal numbers, whether elected or nominated or coopted or registered or picked up in the street like a coroner’s jury. In the case of elected bodies the only way of effecting this is by the Coupled Vote. The representative unit must not be a man or a woman but a man and a woman.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)