Newsreel

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    A news programme shown in cinemas. These were almost always in black and white. Many of them had a propaganda element to them, subtle or blatant. To give a fictional example of the latter:

    "Comrades, the mighty Red Army continues to crush the evil fascists. The brave men of the Rodina have now taken Warsaw and liberated Poland from their evil grip. Casualties were heavy, but the Red Army prevailed".

    A fictional example of the former:

    "Soviet troops enter Warsaw. The people of Warsaw cheer the end of Nazi tyranny and the restoration of freedom".

    Pretty notorious even in their own day for being flamboyantly censored and emotionally manipulative (edging dangerously close to Documentary of Lies territory in some cases), and for often outright ignoring "troubling" topics in favor of "cute" human-interest stories.

    Faded away in the 1950s and 1960s due to the rise of network news. (The last documented newsreel aired in 1967.) Often mocked up in period pieces.

    Examples of Newsreel include:
    • Parodied in the film version of Starship Troopers.
      • Just as well, as the first Starship Troopers movie was made by the same guy who made RoboCop, a movie series also known for its fake commercials.
      • And also because the director wanted to evoke the Patriotic Fervor of World War II-era war films.
    • Citizen Kane has one of the earliest (if not the earliest) examples of an in-movie fake newsreel. Furthermore, Orson Welles had the company he worked for, RKO, use their own newsreel department to create it to make it look authentic.
    • The Incredibles uses a newsreel to explain the Super Registration Act.
    • In Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, a newsreel provides Eddie Valiant with a crucial clue in solving the Acme murder.
    • The first few episodes of Animaniacs began with a newsreel setting up the Backstory of the Warners.
    • In an episode of Scooby Doo (the one with Scooby-Dee), the gang watched a newsreel at the Milo Booth film festival.
    • The movie Patton used them as exposition. Although it was rather obvious that they were just there for exposition, it did fit the time period, as newsreels were common.
    • Old-timey newsreels are apparently still attached to films in the 31st century.

    Fry: Ooh, real futuristic!

    • Nineteen Eighty-Four features one, depicting an Oceania attack on a refugee convoy. Yes, where the story is set. Yes, it even goes as far as to praise it. Yes, a newsreel in The Eighties.
    • Star Trek: Enterprise: Part Two of Storm Front which takes place in an alternative timeline where Nazi Germany is winning WW2 begins with a fake newsreel showing Hitler touring an occupied New York.
    • Likewise in the 1966 film It Happened Here (in which Great Britain has been occupied by the Nazis) there is a newsreel showing a revisionist history of British/German relations. Chillingly it is narrated by a well-known voice-over reader of the war years.
    • Used as the intro for Star Wars The Clone Wars as well as the TV series. It actually helps set the tone quite nicely in the case of the TV shows moreso than it did for the movie.
    • Used in the pre-title scene of Race for the Yankee Zephyr (1981) to introduce the titular WW 2 aircraft and its cargo (a shipment of medals, booze, and $50 million in gold). The B&W footage of the aircraft ends with smoke pouring from its engine and the pilot looking out the window in alarm, then it vanishes into the clouds, setting up the contemporary events of the film when the crashed plane is discovered.
    • Up opens with young Carl watching a newsreel on explorer Charles Muntz.
    • StarCraft concludes the Brood War Terran campaign with a newsreel, with all the propaganda elements they could fit in.
      • Before all that there was the UNN which was used by the Confederacy/Dominion as a propaganda machine to promote pro-faction news, and to label Sons of Korhal/Raynor as terrorist.
    • Zork: Grand Inquisitor starts with a mock newsreel of the propaganda-heavy variety (it's entitled "Propaganda on Parade". Subtle.)
    • Private Schulz uses these for exposition purposes during the series, which takes place throughout and after World War II.
    • A League of Their Own uses the newsreel to promote the AAGPBL.
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