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This page contains information on Academic Film research resources. Click on
the following headings to be taken directly to that section:
Academic Film Research Resources, Current (Print)
Academic Film Research Resources, Out of Print (Print)
Academic film Research Resources (CD)
Academic film Research Resources (Online)
Copyright Information Resources
Academic Film Research Resources, Current (Print)
 | Alexander, Geoff.
Academic
Films for the Classroom: A History (2010, McFarland) Written by
the director of the Academic Film Archive of North America, this book
provides a history of the educational film movement in North America, with
special chapters dedicated to film companies (e.g. Encyclopaedia Britannica
Films) and individual filmmakers (e.g. John Barnes) that contributed to the
genre. |
| Alexander, Geoff.
Films You Saw
in School: A Critical Review of 1,153 Classroom Educational Films
(1958-1985) in 74 Subject Categories
(2014, McFarland). The companion volume to Academic Films for the Classroom:
A History, this book reviews more than one thousand academic classroom films, classified into 12 major
classifications and a number of other sub-genres. It provides an essential insight into
little-known behind-the-scenes stories that drove the making of these films,
many of which are as relevant today as when they were made. More than 200 of the
films discussed are available for public
viewing on
the internet. This book will have special appeal
to educators, home-schoolers, film researchers and scholars, and cultural
historians. |
| Orgeron, Devin & Marsha, and Streible, Dan (Editors).
Learning with
the Lights Off: Educational Film in the United States (2012,
Oxford University Press). This book contains 19 essays covering a breadth of
the educational film movement, including industrial, medical, nature, and
race & religion films, as well as writings on archiving and collecting. |
| Smith, Ken.
Mental
Hygiene: Better Living Through Classroom Films 1945-1970 (1999,
Blast Books). This book focuses on the Guidance film sub-genre, with
emphasis on sex, drugs, dating, and driver safety films. Filmmakers such as
Sid Davis, and companies such as Centron and Coronet are profiled. |
Academic Film Research Resources, Out of Print (Print)
| Bowker's Educational Film Locator was an easy-to use guide, made
in cooperation with a large consortium of university film centers.
Like Landers (below), it contains bibliographical information, but without
credits for individual directors and producers. The first edition, in
one book, was published in 1978. Far more valuable was the two-volume,
4th edition of 1990-1991, since most academic film companies had stopped
producing films in 16mm by 1987 or so. |
| Footage 89, published by Rick Prelinger in 1989, contains
abstracts and contact information on many of the companies producing film
and video of the era |
| Landers Film Reviews were an informational guide to most of the films
sold to schools during the years of 1960 through 1989, published five times
a year by this now-defunct Escondido, CA firm. Each film review
included a synopsis and credits. While full of great data, you have to
search each issue separately, and master index of all films in all years
would be useful. If it exists, we haven't found it yet. |
| H.W. Wilson Company's Educational Film Catalog (later
Educational Film Guide), published its first edition in 1936, before
doing it annually beginning in 1943 |
Academic film Research Resources (CD)
| AV-Online was a CD resource containing bibliographic records of over
660,000 educational moving image items, compiled by NICEM
(National Information Center for Educational Media), dating from 1900
through 2007. The CD is no longer available (see Online resources
below). |
Academic film Research Resources (Online)
| View many of our films at the
Academic Film Archive of North America
collection on the Internet Archive,
all available to view free of charge, . |
| Skip Elsheimer's AV Geeks
site is a campy, fun site that showcases another aspect of the educational
film world |
| Tom Davenport's terrific Folkstreams
site is a "National Preserve of Documentary Films about
American Roots Cultures," streamed with essays about the traditions and
filmmaking. Worth a visit. |
| Cool Conservation's
Motion
Picture Film Preservation web page provides a number of links to pages
relating to a myriad of storage, preservation, and identififcation links.
|
| Scott Stark's
Flicker site has
done a fine job documenting alternative cinemas all over the world.
If you're traveling, consult his site first to find interesting cinema
(click on "Venues") . |
| Pratt Institute's
Art on Screen database covers the world of
art on film (we found 51 wonderfully annotated references
to films on Picasso alone.) |
| WorldCat is a union
catalog that itemizes the collections of 72,000 libraries in 170 countries
and territories[1] which participate in the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC)
global cooperative. It is built and maintained collectively by the
participating libraries. |
| The National Film Board of Canada has two options for researching
their films. To search for a film and metadata, visit:
https://collection.nfb.ca/home To view many of its films
online, visit https://www.nfb.ca/explore-all-films
|
|
Affordable Colleges Online's resource guide for college students
explains how to get beyond superficial or unreliable searches. While
standard search engines are convenient for accessing the surface web, it
doesn't get to "hidden" sourcing from academic journals, digitized archives,
and databases. The guide gives instructions on how to use the
"invisible web" for college-level research, includes advice on how to assess
a resource's accuracy, and links to many additional deep research resources
for students, regardless of academic discipline. |
| A-V Online, discussed in CD resources above, can now only be ordered as
an online subscription.
As of November 2015, pricing for one simultaneous user access is: $2,254,
unlimited usage is $6,311. |
Copyright and Fair Use Information Resources
| Copyright is a Byzantine labyrinth of laws, made easier, in terms of US
film copyright issues, by Cornell
University's
Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States, based on
research and documentation by Peter Hirtle, Laura Gasawy, and others.
It is printable as a PDF document. |
| For European film copyright laws, visit
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32006L0116:EN:NOT
, which codifies Directive 2006/116/EC of the European Parliament and of
the Council of 12 December 2006 on the term of protection of copyright and
certain related rights. Articles 2 and 3 have specific references
to cinema copyright issues. |
| Since many film researchers make liberal use of quotations in their
writings, we recommend two resources that discuss fair use law. See the
EduBirdie Copyright Law page for some basic ideas, and the
University of Texas
Copyright Crash Course for a more in-depth discussion. |
| National Paralegal College is an exceptional resource for seemingly
everything related to
Patents, Trademarks & Copyrights. |
| UPrinting's
Guide to Copyrights, Trademarks and Patents in Print and Beyond hosts a
number of outstanding resources ranging from copyright law to Fair Use |
|
