All Films

Shadow on the Prairie (A Canadian Ballet)

1953 • 14 min • Canada

A ballet about the settlement of the Canadian West and the fate of a young wife who comes to the prairies with her husband.

Partizan

1953 • 11 min • Yugoslavia

A documentary film showing the members of "Partizan" - a physical education organization - performing exercises as well as welcoming and sending off the Tito Relay.

Operation Doorstep

1953 • 10 min • United States of America

This Civil Defense films shows the results of atomic testing on houses at Yucca Flats, NV. Although the purpose of the film was to inform viewers of what rooms of the house to avoid in case of atomic attack, the film's failure to mention the dangers of radioactive fallout caused the government to have it pulled from circulation in 1959 and declared obsolete.

The Shovel

1953 • 17 min

Part of BFI's "National Coal Board Collection".

Heir Bear

1953 • 6 min • United States of America

Barney inherited a map to treasure buried in his backyard, but his digging doesn't square with the plans of the gopher sleeping on the treasure.

Sunday by the Sea

1953 • 14 min • United Kingdom

London families spend a day at Southend-on-Sea.

Congrès eucharistique diocésain

1953 • 8 min • France

A Catholic holiday in a rural village in Auzelles, the filmmaker's native region in the Massif Central.

Wee Water Wonders

1953 • 10 min • United States of America

A short documentary film about teaching youngsters to swim at the Lissa Bengtsen school in California directed by Jack Eaton. The film was nominated for an Oscar for Best Live Action Short Film.

Skid Row Holdup

1953 • 10 min

Confined to two sets, this vaudeville-style burlesque film was photographed by veteran cinematographer William C. Thompson and released during the decline of 3D movies in the 1950s.

Obmaru

1953 • 4 min • United States of America

"Marx was born in Queensland, Australia, and was a landscape painter and model there before moving to San Francisco. However, when she arrived, she found herself in the midst of fascinating non-objective painting and filmmaking activity. She was greatly influenced by the work of Harry Smith and Jordan Belson, and changed her own style to non-objective, receiving graphic inspiration from Jungian brain drawings, symbols in the occult sciences, and the design used by Eastern cultures, all of which being important elements in the San Francisco school mystical school of non-objective art." -Robert Pike, A Critical Study of the West Coast Experimental Film Movement. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2000.

Safety Spin

1953 • 7 min

The near-sighted Mr. Magoo (voice of Jim Backus) decides it is time for him to renew his drivers' license. Trust to form, he heads for the motor vehicle bureau but winds up at a maternity hospital.

The Grey Metropolis

1953 • 15 min • United Kingdom

Nights and days, thoughts and songs, and the places loved in youth are recalled by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Mental Hospital

1953 • 19 min • United States of America

Case study documenting a patient’s treatment for paranoid schizophrenia. Made for health professionals, Mental Hospital shows daily life at the state facility, including hydrotherapy and electroconvulsive therapy sessions. The film ends with the patient’s discharge.

Flying with Arthur Godfrey

1953 • 48 min • United States of America

TV host Arthur Godfrey takes controls of an Eastern Air Lines passenger plane to show us "behind the scenes' of a 1950's American airline company. WDTVLIVE42 - Transport, technology, and general interest movies from the past - newsreels, documentaries and publicity films from my archives.

Cleopatra Follies

1953 • 9 min

CLEOPATRA FOLLIES aka FLAME OF ISLAM was the first of five burlesque shorts presented in “Gorgeous Multi-Color” anaglyphic 3-D by Oakland and San Francisco burlesque theater magnate, Harry A. Farros. CLEOPATRA FOLLIES starred popular dancers Paula French and Shirley Hayes, aka The Pussy Cat Girl. The long-lost 1953 3-D burlesque short by the great Ed Wood Jr., writer and director of such timeless classics as GLEN OR GLENDA, BRIDE OF THE MONSTER and PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. Photographed in “exciting Multi-Vision Third Dimension,” CLEOPATRA FOLLIES was recently discovered and restored by the 3-D Film Archive.

People's New Hangzhou

1953 • 53 min • China

A propaganda documentary on Hangzhou before and after the liberation.

Magoo Slept Here

1953 • 6 min

Mr. Magoo decides to sell his old house and plans to make an additional profit by selling off his furnishing as antiques. But, the near-sighted Mr. McGoo can think better than he can see, so he inflates the value to the tax-collector and lowers it to the antique dealer.

Cash Stashers

1953 • 9 min • United States of America

This Pete Smith Specialty short shows, humorously, the disastrous results when people save their money in unsafe places.

Mandala

1953 • 3 min • United States of America

Scroll paintings prepared like film strips with successive images.

Home Nursing: Fundamentals

1953 • 14 min • United States of America

Illustrates various techniques and household arrangements for caring for the convalescent patient at home. Shows ways of arranging the sick room, making the beds, washing and serving the patient, caring for the thermometer, and removing soiled linens. Pictures the distribution of chores among the family members and demonstrates some necessary precautions to prevent the spread of the illness.

Maestro Plecnik

1953 • 13 min • Yugoslavia

Documentary showing buildings made by great architect Joze Plecnik in Prague, Wien, Ljubljana...

The Wind and the River

1953 • 10 min • Sweden

A lyrical short documentary by Arne Sucksdorff about life along the Jhelum River in Kashmir. Through images of the people who live and work on its banks, the film captures the interplay between daily labor, the landscape, and the rhythms of the river itself.

Presenting Jane

1953 • 14 min • United States of America

In the summer of 1952, poets John Ashbery, Frank O’Hara and James Schuyler collaborated with filmmakers Harrison Starr and John Latouche on a short film in tribute to their mutual friend, the painter Jane Freilicher.

The End

1953 • 35 min • United States of America

A short film which explores the last day in the lives of six different people.