Harold Baim

Harold Baim film producer, director and writer. Born in Leeds in 1914, he died in 1996.

Baim was a prolific producer of 35mm short films, the subjects of his early films featured well known musical and acts such as Wilson, Keppel and Betty. His later films included widescreen travelogues filmed in England, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Musical acts featured included variety theatre performers and well known pop music acts of the era. Many of these films were released in colour.

The travelogues are perhaps the best remembered of Baim's output. The commentaries on these were provided by famous actors and broadcasters of the period. Typical examples include 'Telly Savalas looks at Birmingham' and 'Peter Murray takes you to Coventry'.

These short films preserve an historical record of their subjects.

Baim provided an early career boost for Michael Winner who directed and scripted a number of films in the early 1960s, including "Floating Fortress" about life on HMS Victorious and the popular comedy about modern manners "Behave Yourself".in which Winner makes a fleeting appearance in the title sequence. Amongst the other films is the feature length musical The Cool Mikado starring Frankie Howerd based on the comic opera by Gilbert and Sullivan.

Several 'B' features were also made, including the haunted house thriller 'Night Comes Too Soon' (aka 'The Ghost of Rashmon Hall'). The short films are often considered to be quota quickies originally created for British cinema distribition enabling cinema chains to meet legal requiremnts for the minimum number of UK-made productions shown.

A documentary on Baim's films featuring Telly Savalas as the narrator was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on 26 April 2008. Entitled "Telly Savalas and the Quota Quickies", presenter Laurie Taylor investigated the background of Harold Baim and the films "Telly Savalas Looks At Birmingham", "Telly Savalas Looks At Portsmouth", and "Telly Savalas Looks At Aberdeen". The 'quota quickies' were required to be shown in cinemas before the main feature by law, first introduced in 1927, which required cinemas to show a British made film along side every American feature. The radio programme and films clips are available on the baimfilms.com web pages.

* [http://www.baimfilms.com/ Archive lists clips and information about Baim Films ]