Storm

Storm (1943)

** (out of 4)

A rather confusing entry in John Nesbitt's Passing Parade series. The film starts off telling us how various people protect their belongings from dangerous weather. Here we see orange farmers burning fires to keep frost off as well as folks making sure the heavy rain doesn't damage anything. Towards the end of the film we flash to some sort of strange poem or just poor dialogue being said discussing weather and its impact on the world. I must say that I love this series yet this is the first time I've left scratching my head. Most of the time this series talks about important things that we might not know who created them or small miracles that can't be explained. What exactly this film was trying to do or say is beyond me as it really feels like we get an opening and closing but nothing in the middle. It's as if the "story" section was just completely edited out because there's really nothing here to comment on. At first I thought TCM had actually showed an incomplete print until I checked the running time and it was complete. A real strange one that makes no sense.

John Nesbitt narrates. He first describes the progression of storm predictions from medieval superstitions and naturalistic observations. It talks about modern science, but it doesn't go into any details. A guy launches a balloon. Apparently, that's enough science. Then it's a lot of weather. It's weather porn. It's all rather superficial. This is a nothing short.

I learned nothing. Nothing is really entertaining unless storms are your thing. A couple of kids almost get taken by Pennywise. This is a lot of nothing or eight minutes of nothing. There really isn't anything. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

I usually enjoy the "Passing Parade" shorts on Turner Classic Movies. John Nesbitt usually takes some anecdote - maybe a personal one about early 20th century Americana, maybe a tale of some remote place or person, and tries to tie it into modern times (1940's in this case). But here I can't figure out what Mr. Nesbitt's point was. He starts out talking about the weather and how at first it was considered something magical or having to do with the gods, and then he talks about the progress of science in predicting storms. He gets a bit melodramatic at this point and talks about different reactions to different predictions - preventing freezing of citrus, delaying or hurrying a shipment in reaction to a predicted storm at sea, etc. Then the short just turns into pictures of different kinds of storms in progress with really no point other than audiences not having access to that kind of imagery prior to television.

His final point is that the person who perseveres the storm is rewarded. Huh? At first glance this dialogue has a stream of consciousness feel to it like some Ed Wood production. But then I noted the year it was made - 1943. Maybe Nesbitt was trying to equate storms and persevering to the then raging WWII? Just a guess, and that's something you did not commonly need to do with John Nesbitt, since the Passing Parade shorts were usually sharp in focus.

Please don't prejudge the others based on the jumble that this one is.

This is a very unusual addition to the DVD collection from American Film Archives, as it's NOT a tiny obscure independent film but one from MGM. I am not sure why such a film was included, actually, as its style is rather different--and actually has some commercial value and is polished. So many other films on the same DVD appear to be homemade or by tiny companies.

This is an 8 minute short about the weather and weather bureau. Its style is rather lyrical (hence I think that's why it was included on the DVD). It discusses the history of weather prediction, impact of storms on our lives and the like. Interestingly, major portions are unnarrated and just show a snow storm. All in all, a dull little film that is neither very informative nor very interesting.

Here's another of the PASSING PARADE short subjects that John Nesbitt produced and narrated for MGM. Here, the subject he tackles is the storm, and the people who are affected by it.

He also shows some nasty weather, ships in harbors fighting the wind, people on city streets in a blizzard..... and of metaphorical storms which, he assures us, will pass.

The year was 1943, and the Second World War was beginning o go America's way. That storm was not past, not yet, but it would.

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