Philips Lamp Light Band
(1957)
Leading in lamps and lighting
Cinema advertising film for Philips lamps.
Content
The Philips Lamp Light Band film is without spoken text in which lamps have been transformed into people. Of course, they live at night because that's when their light comes to life. A lamp man lives in the floor lamp. He takes his girlfriend to the zoo where an orchestra also plays. All figures are made of Philips lamps.
Trivia
Electronics company Philips owed its huge growth partly to sales of light bulbs. Not surprisingly, this product, which was present in all households, was frequently used as the subject of an advertising film. Dollywood made several such films for Philips. Invariably, lamps acted as people, but also as animal figures. The compact, inflexible shape of a (incandescent) lamp is far from ideal for turning it into an animated figure. After all, a lamp lacks a flexible backbone and neck. How should such a figure be able to bend or turn its head? For this reason, some figures were constructed from several lamps. This created an ‘upper body’ and lower body, as seen in some animals and ‘orchestra members’. Almost all animated figures were turned from wood and painted white. Where the figures needed to light up, a painted real lamp was used (where possible). The possibilities for the animator to animate a real lamp were lacking.
Award
The film Lamp Light Band received the Venice Biennale (Italian: Biennale di Venezia) award at the Fiera de Milano industrial fair. This is a leading international art event held biennially, in Venice, since 1895. That is why it is called a biennale. The annual Venice Film Festival ‘Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica’ has been held since 1932.
More light
Dollywood made several such films for Philips. In each case, lights acted as people. A film was also made about a Miss pageant (Philips Light Contest - 1959) in which elegant lady lamps step into a fitting to be praised by an increasingly frenzied jury. All the lamps are 100% quality. They also all turn out to be Philips branded.
Another production is called ‘Philips Light Show’ (1952). The film looks like a free production without a tight storyline, but a sequence of short revue-like performances.
Credits
- Title: Philips Lamp Light Band
- Year of production: 1957
- Duration: 4 minutes
- Produced by: Joop Geesink's Dollywood
- Client: Philips Lighting Ltd
- Composer: Unknown, possibly Hugo de Groot
- Performed by: Unknown
- Art Director: Henk Kabos
- Animation: József Misik
- Camera: Unknown, possibly József Misik
- Puppets: Harry Tolsma and others
- Puppets clothing: Lia Sten and others
- Props: Unknown, possibly Theo Doreleijer and others
- Set paintings: Ko (Jacob) Brautigam
- Format: 35 mm, Technicolor
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