Commercial Reel: Military Training #1

Year Published: 1970

Complete Record: 1. The Lord’s Prayer. B/W. 00:03:00. It’s produced by United State Air Force. the lord’s Prayer: Sung by the Singing Sergeants. A choir formed by above 20 men is singing on the stage of a church, standing in front of a cross. One of them comes to the front to be the lead singer. Everyone wears suit and bow tie. It is cut between close-ups of the leader and wide shots of the whole choir. The song last about 3 minutes. The film ends when the song is over, 2. North American Air Defense Command - Star Spangled Banner. color, 1970s (?) 00:02:00 Three military officers are standing by the flag rod. One military officer is raising the Star Spangled Banner with his hand when the national anthem begins, with the national flag fluttering wind. Soldiers standing in line salute. Then there appear medium shots of several sergeants or generals with a lot of badges on their uniforms in turn. The banner is rising up slowly. Then the medium shots of women sergeants saluting to the Star Spangled Banner come up. We can see the wide shot of the banner. It’s been already raised up high. Then there appears the wide shot of the NORAD band playing the national anthem in front of a grand white building. It ends up with the close-up of Star Spangled Banner fluttering in the wind. 3. U. S. Air Force Blue. B/W. 00:02:30. United State Air Force presents. As recorded by Mitch Miller and his orchestra. The presentation has been made possible through the cooperation of the American Federation of Musicians. First shot is the wide shot of the Star Spangled Banner. It’s been already raised up high and is fluttering in the wind. Then there appear a lot of shots of USAF planes. They’re probably having a performance to show flying tricks. One white plane is flying up from the ground while four black planes is already in the high sky. We see one plane rotating and then flies down. We see six pilots taking up their equipment. They take on the backpack and get on the plane through the front gate one by one. We see the plane takes off and flies up while six black planes as a team flying into the clouds. Following is a FC-802 flying over the mountains. Soon the six also get to the sky above the mountains. We can see one black plane flying. Then three white do so. There is a wide shot of military parade. Finally there is a white plane flying and rotating. 4. “Ready, About!”. color, 1970s (?) 00:03:00. First shot shows five young men in white T-shirts sitting on a sailboat numbered 22 in the sunshine. We see a close-up of one man’s smile. Then voice-over introduces that - “Seaman skills can be learned through their sails improve for some skills are the same and have been used for centuries. As United States Naval Academy wishes, leaders of tomorrow may continue the tradition. They have an affection with the sea.” It seems that they have been separated into different teams to go sailing. So there are a variety of shots showing the process of their sailing. Shots of pulling strings, yachting, steering and adjusting the sails are shown. Finally there are some shots of big ships and some harbor like navy training station. Ending text is “ united states navy’. 5. U. S. Naval Observatory. color, 1980 (?). 00:03:12. We can see a lot of watch, clocks and measuring equipment. We can see someone adjusting his watch on the wrist. The time is 10:15 right now. There appears the wide shot of someplace like a base or station. Voice-over tells the audience that in U. S. the measurement of time is all set up by the Naval Observatory. When we know the time from the radio or telephone system, the information are provided by Naval Observatory. Thus the following shot shows the banner with text “U. S. Naval Observatory Established 1830” on it. Voice-over indicates it has a history of more than 150 years. They use ships in the sea and planes in the air to do some measurements. As the graph illustrates, solar time can be figured out by measuring movement. One system of time is ephemeris time, it can be measured through observation of the moon by telescope. Another system is called sidereal time. We can see the graph of “CESIUM BEAM ATOMIC FREQUENCY STANDARD AND CLOCK”. Voice-over points out that, the responsibilities of Naval Observatory not only include distributing the time but also checking accuracy of it. Then through television and broadcasting, those information can be distributed. “FLAGSTAFF STATION” - wide shot of largest telescope is shown. Naval Observatory is providing accurate time for the public. This is one of its mainly functions according to the voice-over. In the end, the wide shot of someplace like a base or station appears again. 6. A Menu For Men. color, 1970s (?) 00:03:15. First shot is the building and its banner “MICHELSON HALL” with the company of singing. The title “A MENU FOR MEN” comes out. Many shots of the life of navy are shown as follows: soldiers walking in the woods, sportsmen playing baseball and audience cheering, soldiers having a class and taking notes, steering ships in the sea, doing experiments in the lab. They seem quite busy all day. So voice-over said their appetite during the training is not easy to satisfy. They have a big dinning hall offering food and drinks. There are no lines and no waiters. It’s not so much what a Naval Academy midshipman eats it’s what gives him his appetite. After many grueling hours of brain-wracking classes... stiff military training... and muscle-bruising sports, each man is ready to tackle to meal fit for Paul Bunyan. Serving these meals - 4300 at one sitting - is a logistics problem of mammoth proportions - and one that Bancroft dining hall executes three times daily, with the cool precision of a crack drill team. Then we see the crosscutting between the soldiers training, marching in the open air and chef preparing food in the dinning hall. After the training, soldiers come to have meals. Camera follows one entering, sitting down and passing over the dishes. He smiles and starts eating. 7. Chief Brashear. color. 00:03:37. The film mainly introduces a master diver, Carl Brashear, a senior Chief from the United States Navy. All the shots are about his diving or living. Under the sea, beside a submarine the diver is diving professionally. On the deck, several men are helping him adjust his diving equipment. We can see his face clearly. The shots of his jogging along the road, doing exercises in the gym and boxing are shown. His diving under the sea is shown again. From the close-up shot we know that he is teaching “DIVING & SALVAGE”. We can see he walking towards the classroom; making phone calls; also giving lessons to the young. Last shot shows on the deck he is ready to dive. 8. Spirit of the Sea. color. 00:03:42. There is a ship at pier. A man is walking around. He gets on the ship. As he walks along, he looks at the things on the ship, tries to steer. He sees several old photos on the desk. A seagull flies away from a string. He gets off the ship and comes towards a base. He takes out a card from pocket to show it to the guard then he is allowed to enter it. He walks downstairs open the compartment. Then there is crosscutting among the shots of the sea, the soldiers, the ships, gears, strings, steers and etc. Someone on the bank is holding a banner with text “welcome home”. The soldiers receive their wives’ hug. A man with a cap walks upstairs to get on the deck, watching the sunset in the sea. Finally subtitle PRODUCED FOR THE UNITED STATES NAVY comes out. 9. World Without borders. color. 00:03:42. First shot shows through a cave covered with ice, there are snowy mountains with sunshine. it is an amazing landscape. A new look at Antarctica... with an array of quick impressions cut to an original score. As the voice-over says, Antarctica is the unique laboratory in the world. Shots are crosscut between the penguins and activities of explorers. Shots of GB 2 ship launching, planes landing, chopping woods, parachuting are shown. The explorers settle down. Bearded explorers... sturdy huskies... and unflappable penguins still accent the landscape as American scientists with the assistance of Navy support teams, delve into the Antarctic ice in search of the secrets that lie there, frozen in time and unchanged for two million years. We can see a lot of devices and buttons in control room, explorer washing faces, skiing, chef toasting bread, men playing snooker, washing clothes, shaving. and etc. There are penguins and also sea lions. A lot of national flags including US stand on the land of Antarctica. 10. Flight Deck. color, 00:04:30. It is an exciting visual impression of air operations abroad the Carrier U. S. S. John F. Kennedy. It looks like after sunrise, in the sea, a lot of pilots are doing exercise with the planes. Shot of planes comes out when there is a title “Flight Deck”. It is quite an adventurous event. But the pilots seem to be confident. One of them smiles and passes by in front of the camera. On the ground, there are navigators to guide those flights. Then we can see quantities of shots of plane flying, running on the lane and taking off; views on the plane as well. Beautiful clouds and sunshine can be seen. One plane is flying over the camera and soon lands on the ground. They use model planes to study the routines. One navigator is watching the flying flights. Voice-over considers flying a challenge at such a windy dawn. It ends up with a big ship and text “united states navy”. 11. Convoy. color, 00:04:38. “The U. S. MARINE CORPS Presents”. No voice-over all the way. Close-up of wheel rolling and title CONVOY show up. In a jeep, a man is calling to the others through talk back. There are troops and jeeps, trucks with national flags. Soldiers are on the trucks in the wild. One of them is staring at somewhere forward with hopes. It seems to be in winter. Some earth are covered with snow. Jeeps and trucks are running through muddy road or wet road one by one. Navigators use body language to give the guidance of direction to drivers. Shots of drivers’ driving show up. The roads are all along the endless hills. Some farmers are chopping woods along the roads. It ends up with ASK A MARINE. 12. Silent Drill. color, 00:05:30. “The U. S. MARINE CORPS Presents”. It is a record of the whole process of a 5:30 minutes’ long silent drill of soldiers. In front of the woods, on the grass, there are 24 soldiers training with their riffles. During the silent drill, we can only hear the sound of riffles and steps. It ends up with ASK A MARINE.