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Movietone News is a newsreel that ran from 1928 to 1963 in the United States, and from 1929 to 1979 in the United Kingdom.
Contents
History
It is known in the U.S. as Fox Movietone News, produced cinema, sound newsreels from 1928 to 1963 in the U.S., from 1929 to 1979 in the UK (for much of that time as British Movietone News), and from 1929 to 1975 in Australia. One of the earliest in the series featured George Bernard Shaw Talks to Movietone News, released on June 25, 1928.
An early conductor of the Movietone News orchestra was Harry Lauder II, nephew of entertainer Sir Harry Lauder, who was contracted by the company for eighteen months before William Fox took him to his Hollywood studio. Sir Harry Lauder also appeared in test sound films made at the Fox Studios in New York City during the winter-spring of 1927.
One installment, Fox Grandeur News, was released on May 26, 1929 in Fox's short-lived widescreen process Grandeur, and shown before the feature film Fox Movietone Follies of 1929.
Hearst Metrotone News initially leased the Case Research Lab patents from William Fox for its sound newsreels. Each of these studios used this system of recording sound film for news items because it was an easily transported single-system of sound-on-film recording.
Fox's first use of recording a news event was on May 20, 1927: Charles Lindbergh's take-off from Roosevelt Field for his historic solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean was filmed with sound and shown in a New York theater that same night, inspiring Fox to create Movietone News. A regular narrator of the newsreels was broadcaster/journalist Lowell Thomas.
In Australia, Movietone and Cinesound were competitors for newsreel coverage, but have now combined under the Movietone News name.
Status and licensing
The University of South Carolina Newsfilm Library has a portion of the Fox Movietone newsreel collection. The rest of it is owned and managed by the Fox Film Corporation's corporate successor (and namesake), Fox News Channel. The majority of the collection is stored in New Jersey, mostly unseen since the newsreels were originally shown in theatres. During its early years, Fox News Channel had a weekend show which played the newsreels.
Licensing for Fox Movietone newsreels owned by the University of South Carolina is handled by the Newsfilm Library, while licensing for Fox Movietone News still owned by News Corp. is handled by the British company ITN, as part of its archive, including Fox News Channel, Reuters, Granada and the UK network Channel 4. British Movietone is owned separately by the films' successor-in-interest, operating under the name British Movietonews Ltd. In the United States, licensing of those newsreels is handled by ABC News.
See also
- Newsreels
- List of online video archives
- Movietone sound system sound-on-film system introduced by Fox Film Corporation in 1927
- Movietone Records the budget subsidiary of 20th Century Fox' record division
External links
Categories:- Newsreels
- History of film
- 20th Century Fox
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