. . . of whether the "priceless masterpieces" featured in Treasure Island's Exposition of 1939 and 1940 were bull-dozed along with the buildings housing them when America got Pearl Harbored, causing the Expo site to be transformed into a major U.S Naval Facility overnight. Obviously, folks cannot be bothered by the trivial niceties of "Art Preservation" when they're expecting a sneak invasion of San Francisco at any moment. Though common sense would suggest that it could have taken a couple pick-up trucks "just" a few hours to load up the more valuable and portable paintings and begin the journey to a safer inland storage unit, the fact that narrator Jim Fitzpatrick never mentions any such convoy may be a dead giveaway that The Authorities That Were did not think they had even a few hours to waste upon fiddling with such Artsy Fartsy cannon fodder. After all, who could argue that ALL the paintings in the world were worth the life of even ONE American serviceman? Fortunately, ALL of the art focused upon by Jim is from the brushes of over-rated third-string flashes-in-the-pan totally forgotten Today (except for a pair of minor efforts by Titian and Raphael--and Titian doesn't even have a Ninja Turtle named after him!).

"Art, no matter what its origin or time, is clearly a joy forever." This short shows the interest the audiences between the wars had in all things artistic, which is why studios like MGM put so many different kinds of music into movies. There was enthusiasm for gaining in sophistication and taste, whether through classes or through their own efforts. It wasn't unusual for people whose only formal instruction was in reading, 'riting, and 'rithmetic, to improve their skills outside the classroom. And those who got to college were just as likely to collect Bach and Beethoven as swing 78s. European hymns existed side by side with American gospel. Simple ballads were popular and so was complex jazz. The 1939-40 public would have oohed and ahed over the light show AND been thrilled to see famous paintings. Excellent as history and beautiful as art. Having missed the first half showing the exhibition by day I didn't have the background on the exhibition that would have made it more interesting but I can't blame this film for my not seeing part one.

Night Descends on Treasure Island (1940)*** (out of 4) This TravelTalks entry is actually a sequel to A DAY ON TREASURE ISLAND and pretty much starts off where the previous film left us. The night comes and we're shown some incredible looking light/fountain exhibits, which were all done by A.F. Dickerson from General Electric. After this we visit some of the famous artwork gathered in a variety of exhibits. These paintings include: Pope Paul III by Titian, Thomas Hart Benton's Romance and Rockwell Kent's To the Stars to name just a few. After going through some of the famous paintings the short ends with another look of the famous statues on the outside and again they're all lite up with the terrific light show. This is one of the stranger shorts in the series because we don't get to learn too much and instead it's just showing off what people would have been seeing at the Golden Gate International Exposition. I thought the Technicolor was put to perfect use during the light show as some of the images are just so amazing that you really want to pause the film and really take everything in. The stuff dealing with the paintings isn't something you'd normally see in the series or at least it wouldn't get as much attention but I thought it was fascinating as well.