90 years ago, Ogonyok talked about the path of cinema to the broad Soviet masses

90 years ago, “Ogonyok” talked about how difficult the path to the broad Soviet masses of the most important of the arts, which, according to Lenin’s definition, was cinema for us. This attitude in itself did not raise doubts in a country where in the 1920s about 80 percent of the population were illiterate rural residents: the authors of Ogonyok had no doubt about the “huge role that cinema will play in raising the cultural level of the 100 million population of our village ". There was no doubt about the idea of promoting only “healthy cinema,” which meant “imbued with communist ideas.” But on this rough road there was a serious problem - lack of technical equipment. As Ogonyok explained, “there were no movie cameras that were simple in design and easy to transport to remote village corners.” Only in 1924, the Leningrad Optical Plant began producing the first mobile film projector in the USSR - the State Defense Order apparatus. This unit, Ogonyok said, “was equipped with a manual dynamo that provided enough light to show a film in audiences of up to 500 people,” which means it could be used in areas where there was no constant source of electricity. However, the device also had a rheostat to operate from the electrical network. At the same time, the weight of the entire set of mobile cinema (which is 23 items) was a record low for those times of 30 kilograms. At test screenings (or, as they were called then, “film gatherings”) using the state defense order, the repertoire included mainly films on subjects that were close and understandable to peasants, for example, about how to cultivate the land in a new way. Glavpolitprosvet recognized the experience as successful and, in order to distribute it throughout the country, ordered 600 film sets at once. And as soon as the project reached the expanses of one sixth of the land, the magical power of the most important of the arts manifested itself in all its glory. As the same “Ogonyok” said, “6 movie cameras sent to the Voronezh, Gomel, Kursk and Nizhny Novgorod provinces at the height of the “drunkenness” on Trinity Sunday captivated (the viewers . - “O” ) so much that the drunkenness usually observed on these days on an incredible scale, stopped."

The first mobile film projector in the USSR was created in 1924 and was immediately put into service: film gatherings were organized throughout the country, where “correct” films were shown
Photo: Ogonyok

Magazine "Ogonyok" No. 31 from 08/11/2014, page 53

Dates – Ogonyok No. 31 (5337) from 08/11/2014