Public safety/information films

[Make Them Die Slowly]

I'm growing a very spikey hedge at the moment out of hawthorn as a gift to the little buggers!

[DeadAlive]

As a bonus it will keep those pesky vampires out too.

[Make Them Die Slowly]

Originally Posted by DeadAlive

As a bonus it will keep those pesky vampires out too.

It works well with witches too according to folklore.

I don't know if this was a national or local film but when I was about 14, the police came into my school and showed a film about the dangers of heroin use.I'm pretty sure it had scenes from a autopsy in it and loads of images of open wounds where people had developed ulcers and abcesses from poor injecting.I do remember it tramatised half the class.

Anyone remember a warning film about dog shit?I think it had a song to it that went along the lines of-once there was a wiggily worm...any ideas anyone.

[VicDakin]

Hell's Highway - The True Story of Highway Safety Films.
Not sure if any one else has mentioned this great dvd,compared to British PIF of the 70s,which on the whole were camp and funny,if not then but certainly now,these safety driving films are about as fun as fire in orphanage,very grim and downbeat these ambulance chasers managed to get to crash sites even before the paramedics mainly due inside info from the police.The doc is a brilliant insight to what started as fairly respectable business but towards the end allegations of corruption and sex scandals ended there docs in the early 70s.

In 1960, accountant Richard Wayman and photographer Phyllis Vaughn started the Cleveland-based Highway Safety Foundation after amassing a sizeable collection of photos taken at auto crash sites and shooting an educational film, SIGNAL 30, which incorporated crash site footage. The Foundation's film production wing, Safety Enterprises, went on to produce a number of now-legendary auto safety films (including WHEELS OF TRAGEDY and MECHANIZED DEATH) incorporating extremely grisly real-life imagery, which were shown to unsuspecting high school students across the United States in the 1960s and 70s. Bret Miller's documentary takes a probing look into the strange story of the people who made these bizarre and haunting films. He includes interviews with genre experts such as educational film archivist Richard Prelinger and Something Weird Video's Mike Vraney, as well as Earle Deems and John Domer--two of the men who worked on these compelling curiosities. While the subject matter is sensationalistic by nature, Miller's approach is reverent, and, though the films have passed on into the land of pop cultural legend, one is never doubtful that those who made the films did so out of a well-intentioned sense of duty and purpose.

[VicDakin]

Been re-watching my Charley Says dvd,as always these short films always makes me feel very nostalgic for the 70s,that i suspose is old age creeping up on me

A priceless record of British society in the 1960s and 70s, Charley Says is two-and-a-half hours of public information films produced by London's Central Office of Information between 1959 and 1983. Topics, though numerous, are dominated by an obsession with safely crossing the road. Mid-1970s celebs such as Shaw Taylor and Jimmy Saville try to coerce us into wearing then-optional seat belts or propound the still-incomprehensible "Splink" theory of road awareness. Dave Prowse looks uneasy as the Green Cross Code superhero months before he found immortality as Darth Vader and Edward Judd briefly achieves cult status with "ThinkBike". Animation is also well represented, with the engaging psycho-babble of Charley the cat and the witty repartee of Jo and Petunia to guide us through the dangers of everyday living, while Tufty and Mrs Fluffytale look concerned as Willie the Weasel gets hit by every car in town. "Lonely Water", however, is a real spine-chiller, and the TV licence-detector man assumes a menace worthy of Quatermass. By the early 1980s, recourse to passing fads such as Space Invaders and break-dancing confirm that the era of paternalistic TV was almost over.

[VicDakin]

COI Collection Vol 4: Stop! Look! Listen! .
The BFI COI Collection of PIF's are one of my fav dvds packed with 60s and 70s short films this really takes you back to those childhood days,full of familiar faces of TV now and then,and covering everything from moped safety with a teen Gillian Tailforth to Donald Pleasance warning about swimming in canals and the classic Never Go With Strangers,Remember never take sweets from a stranger or stroke his puppies .

The Central Office of Information (COI) was established in 1946 and has produced thousands of films that reflect the changing face of a nation, and world, in flux. The fourth Volume of the BFI s COI collection explores the government department s Health, safety and welfare films. Utilising some of the finest talents in British documentary film making, titles such as Thirty Miles an Hour (1946), Lonely Water (1973), Apaches (1977), Drive Carefully, Darling (1975) are amongst the most inventive, and fondly remembered, titles in the COI's distinguished oeuvre. Stop! Look! Listen! makes available on DVD for the first time some classic longer form films along with a selection short public information films and commercials. But please...don't have nightmares!

[VicDakin]

During the seventies and early eighties when the Public Information Films were at there most abundant they were filled with minor celebs all warning us about all kinds of dangers.

[VicDakin]

COI Collection Vol.1 - Police And Thieves
This collection of PIFs all cover different aspects of Law and Order ,including going to prison,teenage delinquents (that never gets old) and your local bobby on the beat.The earlier films date back to 40s then going thru to 60s and 70s,all of them have a camp charm to them and are great time capsules.

Established in 1946, the Central Office of Information (COI) was a successor to the wartime Ministry of Information and was responsible for producing thousands of films which celebrated Britain, its people and their achievements.

This first volume in the COI Collection explores the subjects of policing, crime, delinquency, and the justice system. A variety of styles and genres including story documentary, public information shorts and cinemagazines were employed to deliver crime prevention messages and bolster recruitment. Highlights include: Children on Trial (1946), an approved school drama set in a progressive and enlightened system; Youth Club (1954), which proposed a solution to keeping Britain s young people out of trouble; Help Yourself (1950), a nononsense crime prevention film; Man on the Beat (1956) and The British Policeman (1959), in which the local bobby comes armed with a friendly smile. Together, these films provide a wonderful record of British life in a seemingly more innocent age.

[The Reaper Man@Cult Labs]

[The Reaper Man@Cult Labs]