According to the enthusiastic narration on ‘Amateur Cinematography’ held by the Moving Image Archive, photography serves two distinct purposes; ‘first as a form of record and second as a form of art’. This fascinating 3 minute film, shot in 1948, was made as a trailer for the 10th Amateur film festival held at the Cosmo Cinema, now known […]
Category: Film
Lost Glasgow: The Changing Face of Charing Cross
Earlier this year plans were unveiled to cover a stretch of the M8 motorway at Glasgow’s Charing Cross – to ‘heal the wound’ (as the Herald calls it) opened up in the city as the road was constructed in the 1960s. The National Library of Scotland’s Moving Image Archive (housed here at Kelvin Hall) holds more than […]
Frustration, Fascination and Film Identification
From first viewing, it’s nothing very much to look at, a rather grainy piece of silent colour film lasting just under two minutes. Simply recorded as (Lifeboat Launch) the film was dated rather vaguely as ‘1950s’ with an ‘unknown location’. Time to send in the cataloguers.
The Empire Exhibition 1938
The Empire Exhibition 1938 The Empire Exhibition ran from May to October 1938 at Bellahouston Park in Glasgow. King George VI with Queen Mary officially opened the Exhibition on the 3rd of May 1938 2017 marks seventy-nine years since the Exhibition. Reflecting on current political and social economic trends perhaps we can identify, more than […]
Don’t forget to unpack the film catalogue!
The National Library of Scotland’s moving image archive moved to Kelvin Hall recently and one of the first things we unpacked was the catalogue. The new interactive space offers a unique opportunity for people to engage with a vast range of film, video and digital content. This catalogue is the key to unlocking a vast treasure trove of moving […]
Sausages, steam trains and biplanes : Showcasing 100 years of Scotland on film
Most people when they think of films probably think of the latest blockbusters showing at the cinema; fantastic stories far removed from everyday life, and rarely showing anything of Scotland. What many people don’t realise is that for four decades the National Library of Scotland’s Moving Image Archive has been collecting and preserving all kinds […]
Catching the eye of Martin Scorsese
You’re not quite sure what to expect when you seal an envelope addressed to Hollywood film director, Martin Scorsese in New York. Enclosed was a letter from the National Library of Scotland asking him to support our Moving Image Archive campaign. I wasn’t too hopeful but you just never know so I posted it and […]
Have yourself a very cine Christmas – the power of Frank Marshall’s family films
Only two more sleeps! As children across the land excitedly prepare for Christmas, we unwrap some festive films in the National Library of Scotland’s Moving Image Archive. Not only made for fun and entertainment, they also offer evidence of a thriving amateur film-making culture and an emotionally charged record of Scotland’s past. Here are four […]
Sunset Song on screen
Film adaptations of Scottish literature have been very much in my mind recently. In November we celebrated Stevenson on screen for RLS Day, and last week I was in Inverness talking about the Hitchcock film version of John Buchan’s The thirty-nine steps – now many of us are catching up with the long-awaited film of Sunset song
Stevenson on screen
This week we are celebrating Robert Louis Stevenson’s contribution to cinema with a display highlighting film versions of his most famous novels. Although he died in 1894, a couple of years before the birth of cinema, RLS made an impact on films all the same. He is one of the most adapted writers for the […]