The First Motion Picture Unit (FMPU), officially designated the 18th Army Air Force Base Unit, was the primary film production unit of the US Army Air Forces (USAAF) during World War II and was the first military unit made up entirely of professionals from the film industry. It produced more than 400 propaganda and training films, which were notable for being informative as well as entertaining. Films for which the unit is known include Resisting Enemy Interrogation, Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress and The Last Bomb—all of which were released in theatres. Veteran actors such as Clark Gable and William Holden and directors such as John Sturges served with the FMPU. The unit also produced training films and trained combat cameramen. FMPU personnel served with distinction during World War II.
First Motion Picture Unit is also the eponymous title of a 1943 self-produced documentary about the unit narrated by radio and television announcer Ken Carpenter.
Read more about First Motion Picture Unit: Background, Formation, Life At Fort Roach, Film Production, Combat Cameraman Training, Impact, Filmography
Famous quotes containing the words motion, picture and/or unit:
“... The festival-colored brightness
That is their motion ...”
—Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)
“no picture is made to endure nor to live with
but it is made to sell and sell quickly
with usura, sin against nature,
is thy bread ever more of stale rags
is thy bread dry as paper,”
—Ezra Pound (1885–1972)
“During the Suffragette revolt of 1913 I ... [urged] that what was needed was not the vote, but a constitutional amendment enacting that all representative bodies shall consist of women and men in equal numbers, whether elected or nominated or coopted or registered or picked up in the street like a coroner’s jury. In the case of elected bodies the only way of effecting this is by the Coupled Vote. The representative unit must not be a man or a woman but a man and a woman.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)