First Self-Treatment by Haemodialysis (available for viewing on Open Source Movies).

British newsreel clip from 1963 featuring a man with kidney disease who was able to hook himself up to a dialysis machine, and thus live an “almost normal life.” This fails to convey the fatiguing aspects of dialysis experienced by most patients, but it does have some historical value.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: **. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: ***. Overall Rating: ***.

Bloody Iwo (film #1 on Side B of Disc #2 of the War in the Pacific section of Combat Classics DVD Megapack (Mill Creek Entertainment, 2006)).

This documentary shows us the very bloody battle to take the island of Iwo Jima in great detail from a soldier’s perspective. There are few surprises here, but the story is well told and many of the visuals are quite striking, especially the night combat footage. You really get a feel for the grit of combat from this film.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: N/A. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

Adventures of Chip and Dip (available for viewing on You Tube).

Another great industrial film touting processed foods, this film was sponsored by the Potato Chip Institute, an organization loved by couch potatoes everywhere, I’m sure. Chip and Dip are two incredibly lame animated leprechauns who comment about the proceedings, while chips and dip are foodstuffs that are featured in the many recipes in the film. Yes, this film has all the industrial film necessities, including supernatural visitors (OK, pretty lame ones, but they are there), endless and increasingly unlikely recipes using the product in question, factory tour footage, and questionable nutrition information. Potato chips are touted as “real food,” containing “93% energy” (read: empty calories) and being a “natural source of salt.” Let’s see, calories, salt and fat, three of the main ingredients that bring on the disapproval of the food police, as well as making something taste real good. All that’s missing is sugar, but fortunately that is an added ingredient in many of the potato chip recipes featured (you read that right––one atrocious casserole is even topped with sugared grapes!). An easy 5 stars for this one. By the way, I’m hungry!

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: *****. Weirdness: *****. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: *****.

Base Brawl (film #5 on Cartoon Sing-Along DVD (PC Treasures, 2006)).

At the zoo animals’ baseball game, the elephant team is pulverizing a team made up of cute little forest creatures. During the 7th inning stretch, we are invited to sing along to “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” following the bouncing baseball. This little sing-along toon is rather ordinary, but charming.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: ****. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

Are You Popular? (available for viewing on You Tube.

This 1958 remake of the 40s social guidance classic shows a bit of wear and tear around the edges. The acting is uniformly terrible––the kids look and sound like they were recruited from Centron. The script is basically the same, though this time Ginny is ostracized for dating all the boys at the lunch table, Carolyn has a conversation with a friend about the dangers of going steady (so you can’t date lots of boys and you can’t go steady; what’s a girl to do?), the slightly more sophisticated 50s Carolyn agrees to go to the movies at the Strand rather than a skating party and weenie roast (and there’s no mention of “Teen Town”; the town council must have closed it down after the JD’s took over), and the couple drives away in a big 50s car with tail fins, rather than running down the street throwing snowballs at each other, illustrating the rising standard of living in the 50s. And though the house is different (smaller and poorer-looking, actually), the doorbell chimes in exactly the same way as in the older film. This is not quite as much fun as the older film, losing some of its dorky charm in the updating, but it is worth seeing for the bad acting.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ****. Weirdness: ****. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: ****.

Buy a New Car (available for viewing in The Goldbergs section of TVParty).

Clip from “Molly,” the syndicated version of the early TV classic “The Goldbergs.” In it, Molly and Jake argue over the purchase of a new car. This gives you a feel for what the sitcom was like, but it’s a little hard to make sense of out of context.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: **. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: ***. Overall Rating: **.

Fine Feathers Make Fine Birds (film #20 on The Origins of Cinema, Volume 6: Rare Films (Video Yesteryear, 1997)).

Some rogues steal a car and go out on a joy ride. Police make bungling efforts to stop them, but fail until the joyriders stupidly drive the car into a pond. This allows the cops to make a wet, splashy capture of the ringleader. A rather silly film, all told. A 1905 British film.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: ****. Historical Interest: ***. Overall Rating: ****.

After the Thin Man Trailer (extra on After the Thin Man DVD (Warner Bros., 2005). Also an extra on The Thin Man DVD (Warner Bros., 2005)).

Trailer for the first sequel to The Thin Man, the film that introduced the witty detective couple Nick and Nora Charles. This has few surprises, but it does have titles in a wonderful Art Deco font and that forgotten sense of style from Hollywood’s golden age.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

Anarchy USA.

This film, made by the John Birch Society in 1965, purports to show us that the civil rights movement going on at that time was just a front for the Communist blueprint for takeover of the US. It does this by comparing various events in the civil rights movement to events that precipitated Communist takeover in China, Cuba, and Algeria, as well as strategies outlined in Communist writings. The problem is, just because events have some similarities doesn’t necessarily mean they are linked in any way, and like most conspiracy theories, the charges are framed in such a way that they are impossible to refute. For example, Martin Luther King is charged with being a Communist because he denies being one, like many Communist leaders did before their respective revolutions. Although very limited lip service is paid to the real need for civil rights reform, no political action to attain such reform is portrayed as anything other than Communist-inspired. The real motivations of the filmmakers are revealed when they characterize the recently passed Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts as somehow steps toward tyranny. The idea that giving African Americans voting rights is tyrannical is baffling, unless, of course, you think of “rights” in terms of the right to oppress others. The film comes off as a piece of propaganda that is just as distorted as the Communist propaganda it criticizes. It’s pretty interesting to watch from today’s standpoint, though, as it has lots of great news footage of civil rights demonstrations and events, as well as giving a clear picture of one way in which civil rights were opposed at the time.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: *. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: ****.

Industrial Mobilization (film #5 on Industrial Incentive Films (Vintage Video)).

It's the late 40's and peace has finally come. But just because we've nixed the Nazis and slapped the Japs doesn't mean we can sit on our butts and relax! We've got to prepare for the next war! If you've ever seen the movie Invasion U.S.A., you know how it implies that peace is only the space between wars. This is the documentary version of that sentiment. It seems fairly straightforward on the surface, but just below the surface are some pretty appalling implications. Such as the assertion that women, older people, and disabled people were used extensively in war production in the last war, but that with proper planning we can prevent that in the next. Or that in the last war, working in defense plants was totally voluntary, but that's another thing that can be corrected in the next. Or that preparedness will be achieved primarily through more government bureaucracy. Another appalling Cold War relic.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ****. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: ***.

Insects as Carriers of Disease (available on A/V Geeks. Also available for download from Google Video).

This Disney film is in the same vein as Cleanliness Brings Health, explaining to poor rural people how disease is spread by insects and how such spread can be prevented by proper sanitary practices. Mr. Careless practices very poor hygiene and sanitation in his home, and thus has a lot of insect pests sharing it. He thinks those pests are harmless until the godlike narrator/animator shrinks him to insect size and shows him exactly how flies, mosquitoes and lice spread disease. The film is amusing and effective is conveying its message, using a light touch to soften the usual scare tactics involved in teaching hygiene and sanitation. Fun and charming, in the true Disney fashion.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

Introduction to Haiti (available for download from Open Video Project. Also, available for download from Prelinger Archive).

Standard-issue color travelogue of Haiti and the Dominican Republic, with a focus their history of democracy. There is some subtle racism here, as the narrator seems to be amazed that the “negroes” can govern themselves, and seems thoroughly baffled by their culture. But mostly, this is ordinary, with some nice color footage of the island and its people in the 40s.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: **. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

Anatine (available on Brickfilms. Also available on You Tube).

Uhh, I won’t describe the plot of this very short brickfilm because it would give it all away. Suffice to say that it defines its title through the use of plasticene, and this has consequences.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: ****. Historical Interest: ***. Overall Rating: ****.

First Pictures: Soviets Hail Space Hero (downloaded from Universal Newsreels).

Newsreel showing Russian TV news footage of Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space, being officially honored in Moscow in front of cheering crowds. This is interesting because it shows Russian TV news footage, which was hard to see outside of the Soviet Union at the time. Also included is a story of President Eisenhower returning to his farm in Pennsylvania. This is pretty ordinary, but it has historical interest.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: **. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

Behind These Scenes (downloaded from Google Video).

This Department of the Interior film from 1950 highlights the importance of raw material and energy production in fighting the Cold War. Lots of industrial footage is shown of such things as iron foundries, coal mines, and hydroelectric dams, while the narrator repeatedly emphasizes how increasing production of these things is vital to our national defense. The impact on the environment of all this increasing production is not mentioned, but you wouldn’t really expect it would be, apart from the fact that the Department of the Interior is also supposed to be concerned with conservation, a theme that appears in many early DOI films, but not at all here. No surprises, really, but this has some historical interest.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: **. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ***.

A Fortune in Two Old Trunks (available for download from Open Video Project. Also available for download from Prelinger Archive).

This film tells you way more than you want to know about prunes. About half of it tells the story of Louis Pellier, a Frenchman who brought the first cuttings of French prune trees to California and started the prune industry there. This is told very dramatically with actors, but with no dialogue, just narration and dramatic music, which, of course, provides ample opportunity for the viewer to supply his or her own dialogue in the form of msting. The other half of the film is the standard growing, harvesting, and packaging of produce film, featuring Sunsweet employees wearing uniforms that make them look like nurses. Near the end, we are treated to a number of tasty dishes that can be made with prunes––NOT! These are truly disgusting-looking, folks. All in all, this is your typical grower’s film, though on a subject that automatically increases its camp value.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ****. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ****.

Don’t Talk to Strangers (film #453 on Prelinger Archive).

A little girl named Earline encounters a man on her way home from school who tries to lure her into his car. Obviously, she’s watched plenty of Sid Davis films at school, because she immediately turns him down and writes down the license number of the car. Then she takes this information home to her mother, who, amazingly, blows it off. So the next day, the man manages to successfully pick up a classmate of hers who must have been home sick during the showing of The Dangerous Stranger. When her mother calls the school to inform them that her daughter didn’t make it home, the principal conducts a search of the playground, asking every kid there whether or not they saw the missing girl. None of them did, except for one plucky little boy who saw the girl get into the man’s car. At this point, the police are called, and they go through an excruciatingly long process of calling in detectives (including a female detective with cat’s eye glasses that have to be seen to be believed), questioning all the children again, sending out an APB, and patrolling the streets at about 15 miles an hour. Fortunately, the child molester turns out to be too neurotic to work quickly, so by the time a police officer spots his car and picks him up, the girl is unharmed. (In real life, she would have been raped, dead, and buried in a field somewhere by that time, hence the Amber Alert.) All this is told through narration, with overly-dramatic music on the soundtrack. Then the movie focuses on prevention, which amounts to stating that this never happens to nice families who have regular bedtimes for the children. The narrator tells us that Earline’s mom feels guilty for ignoring her child’s report of the strange man, but this is said over footage of her blithely reading a magazine, looking like she hasn’t a care in the world. In this film, the only smart people appear to be the kids. Watch for the cheesy title cards made with plastic letters and the scary drawing Earline made to go with her theme on dental care.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ****. Weirdness: ****. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ****.

Ce Garcon (downloaded from Bedazzled).

In this French Scopitone, a black pop group sings a catchy song that has a sort of a French Motown feel. Except they dance like white people, so go figure. It’s just this sort of weirdness I like to see in these Scopitones, though. And the song is a real toe-tapper.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: ****. Historical Interest: ****. Overall Rating: ****.

Amos Sensitively Interprets the Literal Meaning of the Lord’s Prayer (available in the Xma TV: How Sitcoms Spent the Holidays in the 1960s and 1970s section of TVParty).

This excerpt from a Christmas episode of “The Amos ‘n’ Andy Show” features Amos explaining the meaning of the Lord’s Prayer to his daughter, line by line. This interpretation of the prayer is neither dogmatic nor maudlin, but expresses genuine human values, ones that most of us would find meaningful even if we’re not particularly religious. It’s great that this was preserved, for it’s one of the most touching religious messages I’ve seen in a TV program.

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: N/A. Weirdness: ***. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: ****.

ABC’s Thursday Night Lineup in 1965 (available on the Classic TV Blog of TVParty).

This isn’t a Thursday night lineup! It’s a Saturday night lineup! Nevertheless, it does feature old fogey variety shows as promised: “The King Family,” “The Lawrence Welk Show,” and “The Hollywood Palace.” All the shows your parents wanted to watch instead of the shows you wanted to watch, except maybe “The Hollywood Palace,” which occasionally had some cool guests, but was on past your bedtime. No wonder we children of the 60s need sites like Bedazzled!

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: ***. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: *****. Overall Rating: ****.