Share your recurring nightmares here. They always used to show PIFs at the end of a day's transmission on terrestrial telly before the National Anthem was played and the weird Engineering Test Transmissions started. Remember seeing this one back in the day:
Good they allowed it to be used but just shows how times change given the song features the lines "Have a drink, have a drive, Go out and see what you can find".
The National Archive link I posted elsewhere has some real gems. I've only watched two today, one (I've seen before and the sheer amount of information and highlighting aspirations that it packs within its 40s runtime) I've seen used in a couple of presentations on effective communication: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/films/1979to2006/filmpage_right.htm The other is a tombstone/milestone in British Spaceflight history. If we had kept up the same levels of funding and international cooperation as we had in the late 50's the first man on the moon would probably have been (in the late 60's) an Aussie travelling in a British powered European rocket flying from an Australian space base: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/films/1951to1964/filmpage_rocket.htm
All the PIF's were. The CoI who produced the PIF was a left-over of our very, very effective WWII 'propaganda' film efforts and was pretty much the first time psychology and the visual/filmic/graphic arts were brought together.
In the early days of motorways there were a number of highly amusing public information films produced to warn against problems like lane indiscipline and making u-turns (before central barriers were put up). From 9.15.
A little bit of base and a little bit of that. Still gets one going. By the way American PFI's especially those regarding road safety were even more graphic. The aftermath of RTA's including dead motorists and pedestrians were shown. No doubt a whole generation were scarred. Having a medical colleague 'gleefully' show me a book of aircraft crash, road crash, gunshot injuries was enough to make the stomach turn.
Yes, times change and you wouldn't get a number one these days with a song that suggested you should "have a drink, have a drive" ! It was good that they allowed the song to be used in the advert as it perfectly set the viewer up for the shock to come and basically showed how what they'd originally written was foolish....
"...not visible like smallpox but a sickness no less dangerous or contagious ...." ...all while the jolly chirpy muscic rattles on in the background. Bizarre !
I remember one that warned children of the risk of being chewed up by a combine harvester during the summer holiday. Good advice
I've lost 7 kids to combine harvesters. That and freak yachting accidents. If only I'd seen the warnings...
Sounds like John Mackenzies Apaches (see post 3 above). Some were targeted at rural areas. There's also one about grain stores:
'my' one was a short film and, I think, black and white. It showed kids happily playing in a corn field oblivious to the combine harvester that was about to gobble them up.
The first two are the ones I was alluding to in the other thread. I watched them both at primary school - at the lower end of the school as well - and I was so badly affected by them that I still can’t watch them to this day! Edit: It’s “Apache” and “The Finishing Line” that traumatised me. I’ve looked at them both on Wikipedia and they’re the ones I have such bad memories of - worse than any horror films I tried to sneakily watch as a child.
This car back seat safety film really affected me when it came out. So easy for back seat passengers not to wear seatbelts. I believe it won awards its message is so powerful...
