A typical college student would be proud of a film collection boasting the classics, ranging from “Harry Potter” to “Roman Holiday.” The modern day film collector may have 100 or 200 movies collected. Imagine having over 500 collected films, and those original 500 later becoming over 25,000 films. This is how A/V Geeks got its start at NC State University.
Skip Elsheimer, founder of A/V Geeks, has been collecting vintage educational films since the early ‘90s. These films were originally used to educate society in their time, and A/V Geeks is giving them a chance to shine in a new generation.
“Fear, Your Teacher,” a showing of films used to induce fear in hope of preventing danger, brought students together at 6 p.m. on Friday in Hunt Library to view and analyze three “scare” films. Marian Fragola, director of program planning and outreach at NCSU Libraries, and K. Sean Finch led the event, as Elsheimer was out of the country working on a project. Tim Buie, a professor in the College of Design, offered commentary on the films as the last film was related to his field.
“Skip Elsheimer has been collecting vintage educational films for years,” Fragola said. “Now he has about 25,000 films that he’s rescued from dumpsters, or people from libraries will contact him saying they are getting rid of old educational films and he takes them in and preserves them.”
“He has so many films he hasn’t even seen them all,” Fragola said. “He picks a theme and then finds films that represent that theme. The theme we’re doing for Friday’s event is about fear, because a lot of old educational films were kind of scare films.”
NC State alumnus K. Sean Finch majored in film studies and philosophy. He was hired by Elsheimer at A/V Geeks after starting as an intern his senior year.
The A/V Geeks show films monthly at Hunt Library. They show films on a variety of topics such as love, dating, nutrition and animals. A professor in a field related to the film will help students discuss and analyze the films afterwards.
“The business model of A/V Geeks is the film archive itself,” Finch said. “We categorize and digitize our films and put them online for anyone to see for free. Another thing we do that brings money in, is digitizing films for filmmakers, and we supply stock footage.”
The event began with a screening of a political filmstrip, which each student read a slide off, as a way for students to get comfortable speaking in front of the group. After the strip, the first film “Live and Learn,” directed by Sid Davis, was shown.
“Sid Davis made many films that were very popular for how gory and ridiculous they can be,” Finch said. “He got his start as a stand-in for John Wayne.”
“Live and Learn” was originally produced to scare children into good behavior. It featured children in a variety of scenarios getting hurt by doing something they weren’t supposed to be doing.
“It’s hard for me to even watch,” Fragola said. “If I were a little kid and I was watching this I would be terrified: I’d never jump off a diving board, never take candy from strangers, never light matches. It’s really powerful. I don’t know if they would make films like this nowadays because it is so alarming.”
The next film, “All My Tomorrows,” directed by film company Centron Corp., was about the dangers of drugs and alcohol, as its target audience was adolescents. This 1979 film featured a teenage girl who suffered a drug overdose and wound up in a coma.
“The ‘scare the hell out of you’ tactic is used a lot when it comes to drugs,” Finch said. “The hospital scenes were three times as long as anything else in the film. They definitely want to drive in the idea that if you do drugs you will end up in the hospital.”
The last film was also directed by Centron Corp., and targeted young professionals. The film was primarily about the dangers of construction sites.
Tim Buie, College of Design professor and industrial design professional, noted that it was interesting to see the dangers of construction in action, as he and his coworkers have told stories of those very dangers.
“Even though they were made in the past, the messages are still the same,” Fragola said.
The “Fear, Your Teacher” theme was chosen for this month’s theme in the spirit of Halloween. Each film featured graphic and gruesome images, along with “worst-case-scenario” plotlines.
The wave of educational films began in the 1940s, when there was a strong urge by the government to address social issues such as drugs, sex and health safety. This was the basis of an entire business that was developed soon after by major film corporations such as Centron Corp., Encyclopedia Britannica and Coronet Films.
A/V Geeks sets out to bring vintage educational films back into learning environments.
“I think a lot of the motive for doing this is getting the films back into the atmosphere for which they were intended — in a classroom,” Finch said.
The A/V Geeks’ next event, “When Data is Art,” will be a viewing of films related to computer arts, such as computer-generated music. The event will be held in the Teaching and Visualization Lab in Hunt Library at 6 p.m. on Nov. 18.
