With their cultural, socio-political, and industrial functions beyond that of spectacle and entertainment, festivals of useful cinema were and still are privileged sites to analyze the evolving relationship between science, media, and society, to influence public sphere agendas, and to play a role in civic life and life-long education. The focus of the project is on useful film festivals as networks and nodes of knowledge transmission, exploration, and transformation. The festivals in this archive-based, comparative study were devoted to scientific, educational, industrial, and governmental films and flourished in the global geopolitical conditions after the Second World War. One of the hitherto under-researched case studies is the International Festival of Scientific and Educational Film (1956–1975), held by the University of Padua in collaboration with the Venice Film Festival. This festival is representative of a broader, international phenomenon of useful film festivals, in which scientists, educators, and entrepreneur competed to create compelling cinematic presentations of the natural and industrial worlds.
Combining concepts and methods used in a variety of disciplines including film and media history of science, science and technology studies, and media archaeology, the project builds upon the growing body of work on useful cinema but expands its focus from the analysis of films to the behind-the-scenes mundane organizational work that enabled communication and exchange. The project investigates questions related to format and audience reception: was there a typical format of useful film festivals after the Second World War? If yes, what are its identifying features? How did the format of the useful film festival challenge or reinforce epistemic boundaries between disciplines, expertise, institutions, audiences? What did the peculiar organization of the festivals, film program, and juries’ reports reveal about the audience, both real and imagined?