THE MOTION PICTURE GOES TO WAR: A POLITICAL HISTORY OF THE U. S. GOVERNMENT'S FILM EFFORT IN THE WORLD WAR, 1914-1918

Prior to 1914, motion pictures had been produced almost solely as popular, mass entertainment. The World War 1914-1918 sharply altered this perception of the cinema. Both the American film industry and government leaders began to recognize the value of films as potent instruments of propaganda. Before American intervention in 1917, allied and German filmmakers had distributed films in the United States with the purpose of changing or reenforcing certain attitudes favorable to their respective national causes. Following American belligerency, the Wilson Administration established the Committee on Public Information (CPI), which, along with the Army Signal Corps and the American film industry, mobilized motion pictures to serve the national interest. Under George Creel's direction, the CPI and the industry produced scores of films designed to explain the Wilsonian programs in the war for the enlightenment of domestic and foreign audiences. Both privately produced theatrical films and government documentaries sought to champion the righteousness of the allied-American cause in the military struggle. During the war, the film industry experienced a tremendous period of growth and innovation in virtually every aspect of the motion picture business in the United States; equally important, the war afforded American filmmakers the opportunity to dominate the world film market. Through their trade associations, American filmmakers voluntarily complied with governmental restraints including the acceptance of various forms of censorship. Engaged in what the government decreed to be an "essential industry," private filmmakers willingly acquiesced in the government's imposed standards designed to promulgate American patriotism. Throughout these years, the film industry anxiously craved public recognition and approval of its services.;In the preparation of this study, research was conducted of extant U. S. Army Signal Corps films, CPI films, and a substantial number of privately produced war films made during 1914-1918. Other documentation used included records of the CPI and its film division, U. S. Army Signal Corps records housed in the National Archives, plus a variety of motion picture trade publications and relevant collections of private papers in the Library of Congress.;This study addresses the wartime collaboration of the film industry and the United States Government during the World War. Once hostilities ceased in November, 1918, the CPI was disbanded and the industry's involvement in the government's film activities ended abruptly. Clearly, collaboration proved more beneficial to the industry than to the government because the continued production, distribution and exhibition of motion pictures would overwhelmingly be the responsibility of private capital in the United States. Not until the films of Pare Lorentz and the U. S. Film Service in the late 1930's, or the films of the War Department and Office of War Information in World War II were films produced or sponsored by the government so readily available to the American public. Historians of the American cinema have tended to depict the motion pictures largely as an art form. This study, however, attempts to examine the development of films during the World War as a vehicle for communication and persuasion. In the absence of relevant evidence, no attempt is here made to assess the effectiveness of film propaganda. Nevertheless, films were perceived as being effective by both governmental leaders and the private producers. American audiences in droves bought tickets and attended CPI films. Many of these films were also shown in allied and neutral countries where foreign distributors received CPI films gratis but were compelled to show the CPI films when contracting for other American-made motion pictures.