Interesting unused rushes from the Depression era are rare, so I thought I’d post these five minutes of them here despite their lack of sports content.
Pathe don’t know when or where: visual clues suggest to me South Wales c. 1937-9. At any rate, the lack of post-War cues is glaring enough, and those are Great Western signals at the end.
These are harsh scenes. Note the way the camera swoops about from image to image without cutting – the choice of shot is anything but amateur, so this is no rookie on his first outing, but the technique jars all the same.
Turn the sound up high. It’s only mechanical noise, but it’s as of its period as the film itself, and ought to be heard.
[vodpod id=Groupvideo.3969241&w=425&h=350&fv=url%3Drtmp%3A%2F%2Fstreaming.britishpathe.com%2Fvod%2F_definst_%2Fflv%3AFLASH%2F00000000%2F00058000%2F00058082%26preview%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.britishpathe.com%2Fmedia%2FReference%2F00000000%2F00058000%2F00058082.jpg%26mode%3Dplayer%26lock%3Dtrue%26borderHeight%3D0%26borderWidth%3D0]
My heart leapt when we reached the smoking chimney – something working, something not abandoned. I also liked the boys showing off for the camera – they were showing off by doing something, rather than just performing the look-at-me antics that modern yoof prefers. Clearly something went terribly wrong when short trousers were rejected.