Philips Radio

“We want a top-class film. And we are approaching you as an artist. Think of yourself as a painter who we’ve asked to create a large fresco on the company, the people from Philips said… I had immediately talked about the workers: These men work in the factory, but they live outside, in my mind, it’s one and the same thing, I had told them […]
It took four months of serious, methodical work to shoot the film. At that time, I was extremely technical and had decided to do some research into special effects and use the most sophisticated methods… It was like writing a poem, I played with all the material Philips fed me and, whenever I could, I got close to the men at work and filmed them […]
After the shooting was over, I had presented a selection of rushes before starting to edit… a woman department manager commented: after seeing all these images, I have noticed they have a double meaning and could be arranged in such a way as to produce a Bolshevik film about our company. […]
Once the film was finished and approved, Philips made copies of it. Disaster followed. Of the forty prints dispatched all over the world, only seven were accepted. The other branches sent the film back. They were outraged. This film with all its negative images of our company is a disgrace and cannot be used for advertising”. (Joris Ivens)