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"Here is a
genuine documentary minus the dead moments of straight
reporting--the best nonfiction picture yet produced...Again, as
with The River, the United States Film Service and Pare Lorentz
have made film history" Franz Hoellering, The
Nation |
This first film for the United States Film Service was a radical
departure in style and content from what Pare Lorentz had done before.
For the first time he used a fictional format to dramatize a very real
nonfictgion problem - the lack of adequate prenatal and obstetrical care
for great numbers of American women. In a quest for authenticity, much
of the film was shot on location at the Chicago Maternity Center. The
principal actors underwent six weeks of intensive training as clinicians
before assuming their roles as doctors and interns.
The film presents images of
an unemployed and undernourished America that Hollywood did not show.
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Fight for Life, directed and
written by Pare Lorentz, 70 minutes, B&W, 1937. Photography: Floyd
Crosby. Editing:
Lloyd Nosler. Music: Louis Gruenberg and Joe Sulivan. Conductor:
Alexander Smaliens. Actors: Will Geer, Myron McCormick, and Storrs
Haynes. Produced by the United States Film Service. |
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