Castle Films

Castle Films was a film company founded in California by former newsreel cameraman Eugene W. Castle (1897–1960) in 1924. Originally, Castle Films produced industrial and advertising films. Then in 1937, the company pioneered the production and distribution of 8 mm and 16 mm films for home projection, moving its principal office to New York City. It became a subsidiary of Universal Pictures and was eventually renamed Universal 8 from 1977 before folding in the early 1980s due to competition from home video.

History

In 1937, Castle branched out into 8 mm and 16 mm home movies, buying newsreel footage and old theatrical films for home use. Castle's first home movie was a newsreel of the Hindenburg explosion.^[1] That same year, Castle launched his "News Parade" series, a year-in-review newsreel; travelogues followed in 1938. Castle also eventually compiled sports films, animal adventures, and "old time" movies excerpted from silent theatrical films. The films were all issued as one-reel entities, running about 9 minutes, affordably priced and box packaged. The films were sold at camera shops, in department stores, and by mail-order catalog. Castle Films were extensively advertised in national magazines.

Castle Films 1942 newsreel about the Doolittle Raid, Yanks Bomb Tokyo

Castle obtained home-movie rights to cartoons from several

Soundies

musical shorts, combining three 3-minute songs into each nine-minute subject.

Castle Films distributed two dozen Christmas subjects over two decades, the first being Christmas-Time in Toyland (released in 1939) and the last The First Christmas (in 1959). The perennial in this category was The Night Before Christmas, a live-action dramatization of the poem; this 1946 release remained in print for 26 years.

Subsidiary of Universal

In 1947, United World Films, Inc., the non-theatrical subsidiary of

Oswald Rabbit, and Chilly Willy

.

In the 1950s, Castle released a highly successful series of

NASA

footage of U.S. space flights were timely in the 1960s.

Castle's most popular series was its line of science-fiction and horror films, many featuring the Universal Classic Monsters Dracula, Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, The Mummy, Creature from the Black Lagoon, and The Invisible Man. The series launched in 1957 and grew to 30 titles.

Name change, decline and closing

Castle Films' name was changed to Universal 8 in 1977 and the new management experimented with longer-length films, but the era of home video brought an end to Universal's home-movie enterprise in 1984. Universal 8 dealt mostly in excerpts, but Universal Pictures Home Entertainment (founded in 1980) offered feature films in their entirety on videotape. Collectors abandoned the excerpts in favor of the complete films.

Competitors

The largest U.S. competitor of Castle Films was

20th Century-Fox

(both under the Ken Films brand name).

Legacy

The complete inventory of Castle Films (more than 1,000 titles over 40 years) is listed in

ISBN 0-595-32491-6

.

Films

News Parade, series
The News Parade of the Year 1942, 9-minute newsreel of wartime footage
Christmas-Time in Toyland (1939)
The Night Before Christmas (1946), live-action dramatization of the poem
The First Christmas (1959)

References

^ Thomas M. Pryor, "Newsreels for the Home", The New York Times, July 4, 1937, p. 100
^ Theodore Strauss, "Of One Man's Castle", The New York Times, April 4, 1943, p. X3.
^ "United World, Inc., Buys Castle Films", The New York Times, January 2, 1947, p. 22. Eugene Castle became vice president of United World, but resigned in 1949. "Business Notes", The New York Times, December 13, 1949, p. 55.

External links

[1] Thomas M. Pryor, "Newsreels for the Home", The New York Times, July 4, 1937, p. 100

[2] Theodore Strauss, "Of One Man's Castle", The New York Times, April 4, 1943, p. X3.

[3] "United World, Inc., Buys Castle Films", The New York Times, January 2, 1947, p. 22. Eugene Castle became vice president of United World, but resigned in 1949. "Business Notes", The New York Times, December 13, 1949, p. 55.

[1]