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The title of Transfer of Skill (1940) echoes that of a highly acclaimed
prewar Shell film - Transfer of Power (1939), also produced by Arthur Elton and directed by Geoffrey Bell. Its content and documentary techniques, too, resemble
those of Shell's self-sponsored prewar output - but updated to meet the needs of
wartime Britain, as expressed by the requirements of its new public sponsor, the
Ministry of Information.
This approach was common to Shell's World War Two work, but in this case the
approach reflects the very theme of the film: the continuities and discontinuities between peacetime and wartime experiences. The film shows how the skills of British craftsmen were applied to work necessary to the war effort
via the use of several brief case studies. These include the application of the
detailed skills of jewellery makers to the production of accurately shaped metal
gauges, the redeployment of fishing rod makers to make machine gun parts, and a
man whose model railway engineering hobby is drawn on in the production of
shell, bomb and gun parts.
Prior to the modestly patriotic coda, the filmmakers convey much of this
information very straightforwardly (factual commentary over silent footage), but
with a deeper thread running through it: the close association of manufacturing
industry with Britain's national identity in both peace and war, and the
importance of the skills and efforts of human beings (as much as machines) to
both.
Patrick Russell *This film is included in the BFI DVD compilation 'Land of Promise: The British Documentary Movement 1930-1950'.
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1. A craftsman's skill (2:40)
