Explore the Society’s film collection online
The Society has an extensive collection of films, representing a unique record of British scientific exploration and geographical documentary film-making from 1922 to 1979, and all the films are available to watch for free online via the British Film Institute (BFI) who host the collection. From the Himalayan peaks to the thickets of the African jungle, there’s more than 120 diverse films to discover. To help you decide where to start, we asked five members of the Society’s staff to pick their favourite films from our collection.
Visit to the RGS by the President of Peru
(25 February 1960)
Head of Enterprise and Resources at the Society, Alasdair MacLeod, chose this short silent film which marks a visit by the Peruvian president Manuel Prado to the Society in 1960. It is the only film in the Society’s archive to offer views of interior spaces from the past. As Alasdair points out, ‘This film provides an important documentary record of how our predecessors – staff, fellows and visitors to Lowther Lodge – viewed the building and how it played a role in telling the story of geography through the display of the Society’s historical Collections.’
Climbing Mount Everest
(1922)
Dr Jan Faull, a former PhD student at the Society, chose this film commissioned by the Mount Everest Committee, jointly representing the RGS and the Alpine Club, to record the second attempt to climb Everest. ‘Captain John Noel produced this extraordinary film using camera equipment specially adapted for use at high altitude. It provides the first moving images of Mount Everest,’ she said.
Libyan desert journeys
(from the 1930s)
Ralph Bagnold is the favourite desert explorer of the Society’s Principal Librarian, Eugene Rae, so it is no surprise his choice features Bagnold’s first expedition to the Western Desert (the eastern half of the Sahara) in 1932. Eugene said, ‘Bagnold was a soldier and a scientist who pioneered the use of cars in desert exploration. After the war, he worked out how dunes travel across a desert and even worked for NASA modelling how dunes might move across the surface of Mars!’
Oxford University Women’s Expedition, Madeira
(1961)
Dr Sarah Evans, Research and Collections Engagement Manager for the Society, has chosen this short film documenting the second in a series of women’s undergraduate expeditions from the University of Oxford in the 1960s. Sarah said, ‘Undergraduate expeditions became increasingly important in the postwar years, and demand for RGS support of such projects led to the development of what is now the Society’s grants programme.’
Canadian Army and Air Force Exercise ‘Musk-Ox’
This feature length documentary chosen by Society Director, Professor Joe Smith, contains layers of complexity and controversy. As Joe says, ‘1947 marks the beginning of the Cold War and hence the Arctic attracted intense military interest. But it also marks the beginning of the Canadian government’s attempt to release the economic potential of the region – and to work out precisely what kind of relationship it should have with Inuit people.’
Watch the full collection at: https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/ collection/royal-geographical-society