|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Newsreel films were first shown in British cinemas from around 1910 and were a popular medium for the distribution of news on national and international events. In the early days of television before the Second World War, the BBC began showing cinema newsreel programmes made by Movietone. However, as the popularity of the medium of television grew, the newsreel companies saw it as competition and no longer supplied the BBC with its material. As a result, in 1948, the BBC began to make its own newsreel style programmes, following the format of cinema newsreels. News stories from this era tended to be light in content and deferential to the political establishment. Stories from this era range from children on their first day back at school to items on the outbreak of the Korean War. Newsreels of this kind are now of historic interest in themselves because they provide a record of the style of early television news reporting. In 1960 the BBC's collection of delicate nitrate newsreel films were handed over to the bfi for save keeping and this act formed the first agreement between the bfi and a public sector institution for the deposit and archiving of television material. The bfi National Film and Television Archive holds over 750 early television news items in this collection, spanning 1948 to 1954. |
|
