Originally published in Movies Plus Magazine
When was the IFI established?
The original title was the National Film Institute and it was set up in 1943 and formally established in 1945. It was set up under the auspices of Archbishop John Charles McQuaid. It’s board would have been made up of teachers and clergy people and educationalists of one kind or another. Its original brief would have been to deal with this new medium of cinema. Cinema had come to Ireland at the turn of the last century and people were a bit apprehensive about how it should be dealt with particularly for children. There had been in 1932 a Papal encyclical called Vigilante Cura which was advising Catholic hierarchies to set up bodies to advise on how Catholic people could deal with the influx of cinema into their country, the potentially adverse effects of cinema.
What was the National Film Institute’s role at the time?
Part of its role was to set up a body that would have a supplementary role to the censor. They would issue newsletters and so on advising people on what films should be watched, what would be advisable. But also and more importantly, follow the recommendations of Vigilante Cura. They also saw that film could be used for educational purposes. Not only was it about responding to cinema on screen but seeing how it could be used in classrooms and also how films could be produced for educational purposes. From quite early on the Institute would have been funded from the Archbishop’s offices in Dublin to purchase projectors and to begin to collect a film library that would be distributed to schools and colleges and so on. The initial objectives of dealing with the potentially evil effects of cinema was soon overwhelmed by the educational role. Throughout the 1940′s and 50′s it’s most active role would have been distributing films to colleges and schools, running courses for teachers in how to use film in the classroom and beginning to acquire film for educational purposes.
How did the Archive get started?
The film library would originally have been an international film library, films would have come in from Australia, Canada and the States and so on and they would have been educational films, teaching kids about biology and geography and so on and the films would have been rented out to schools. On the early 1950′s the Institute began to produce films not only for schools but often for government departments, films about Health and Safety and traffic. The Institute played this role of almost like a government production hub where films were produced by the Institute.
Throughout the years they had interesting projects, at one point they would have been funded to dub foreign films into Irish. So when films were being bought in from abroad to make them more relevant to Irish kids they would have dubbed them into Irish. There are some curious films in the collection. One is showing kids how to build an igloo in Irish. They are legitimately kept as part of the Irish film catalogue even though they are curious films.
Into the late 1980′s; the demand for films for schools was really petering out schools weren’t using films, so the staff that would have been necessary to distribute films, their role diminished and whereas there were video distributing libraries, the Institute was distributing on behalf of other agencies and so it wasn’t a huge move to give the collections back.
Did the Institute keep any of the films?
When the distributing library wound down that seemed a very sensible time to finally focus on the setting up of an Irish film archive. There had been calls since 1917 for the establishment of an archive but there wasn’t an organisation whose job it was to preserve the Irish film heritage. So this was the time when we could isolate the Irish interest material from the library and that would become the core collection of the Irish Film Archive. There would have been hundreds of titles there; all the films produced and distributed by the Institute. We then began to approach likely holders of films – production companies and schools and colleges- and the collection quite quickly swelled from hundreds to thousands. At that point we were in Harcourt Street as the Film Centre was being renovated. There was a period between the buying of the building in the late 1980′s to it’s opening in 1992 where the film collection was floating around the city. We moved into the custom built premises in 1992 and established the Irish Film Archive, and things have only improved since then. We have kitted out the vault with temperature and humidity control so we can be confident that when materials come in that they won’t deteriorate.
The IFI has a large commitment to education. Can you tell me about that?
When he library closed down it didn’t mean that all the educational activities closed down. There had always been an education officer in the Institute and the education role expanded and we now have an education department whose role it is to facilitate teachers of film and media studies around the country and be advisors to the Department of Education. They would produce study materials for teachers and also they would have a very active programme of screening within the centre and also around the country. They have links with the schools and cinemas, not just the art house cinemas but various regular cinemas around the country.
Do you believe that the IFC created a generation of film literates?
The film centre has not created a film literate audience as such, but we’ve nurtured the audience that was here. After the Irish Film Theatre closed the Institute opened the Lighthouse. The idea was to re-familiarise Dublin audiences with non-Hollywood, non-mainstream films. The Lighthouse had a very loyal following and did very well and the idea was to re-consolidate an audience that would move over to the IFC when it opened in 1992. We have come a long way, frequently you can’t get a seat at the films here. People are not just coming to see obvious American films, it could be a Japanese animation or an Iranian documentary. There is an eagerness there. It is exciting that it is not just a like-minded elite.
Why do you have to be a member of the IFI to see certain films?
Membership is an interesting characteristic of the Institute. The cinemas are operated on a membership basis and that means that films can be brought in and don’t require certification by the censor. Which means that we are not paying the censor to certify the films and not having to recoup the investment by leaving the film on for weeks and weeks. This means we can have a very fast turnover of films. Initially it was feared that this would be a disincentive to people coming in but in fact people are familiar with it now and its a routine procedure. The same applies to film festivals. If we are showing a film that has not been certified it is automatically over 18′s.
The UGC has recently opened a 17 screen mega-plex, practically on the IFI’s doorstep. Has this, along with their commitment to showing less mainstream films affected the IFI in any way?
I don’t work closely with the box office but I haven’t heard anything within the Institute. I think that Dublin is so heavily populated that there is room for both of us. I do hear cinema programmers talking about the amount of products out there and that there aren’t enough screens to show them all. I don’t think there will be bickering over titles, I just think there will be more to see. That’s not a very factual response but I haven’t heard us all quaking in our boots.
