Although little is known for certain about the production history of this film, some of the images and shots within British Guiana certainly invite comparisons with Basil Wright’s concurrent work in the Caribbean. However, the subsequent editing and titling of this footage re-contextualises these often striking images of local life into a geographical film aimed at children.

Titles offer simple factual information, noting that ‘the country is protected by lines of dykes, known as sea-defences’, and ‘RICE, which grows in water, is an important crop’. Indeed the titles make virtually no mention of the local people depicted on screen, although there is evidence of the broader social problems. There are scenes showing the local social conditions and homes – a title here notes that ‘most of the cottages are raised on piles to avoid the pervading damp’ – and sequences presenting the local men and women at work, under European supervision, but again these are introduced by a broad, geographical title, ‘The SUGAR plantations of Demerara cover vast areas’. This sequence also features workers enjoying a break and eating. The camera here is positioned alongside the locals at their level, encouraging the audience to empathise and identify with them. The viewer is also positioned alongside the locals in the crowd scenes at the market, which display the minutiae of local life. We see locals passing by on horse and cart, by bike and on foot, carrying baskets on their heads, chatting and selling their fruit and vegetables, while a policeman in uniform stands by.

The titles present the film as a study of the natural landscape and industries of British Guiana – although there is no mention of the bauxite industry – and within this framework they promote the modern British developments within the area. First, the constructed sea defences are shown from a variety of angles – locals climb up and work on these, while some European men direct and supervise – highlighting the modern British responses to local problems. Next, when showing the rice industry, the film reveals three methods for collecting the rice. The first, performed by locals, is described as ‘this primitive method of threshing’, before the film shows a second method (oxen treading on the rice) and finally ‘the latest method’, in which a European man supervises a local man operating a machine. The film clearly aligns the British with modern technological advances, highlighting the disparity, but also the connections, between the ‘primitive’ and ‘modern’ methods. This is again evident in the next scene as two locals with a mule carry the cane along the water, before ‘a crane lifts out the entire load and swings it round to the factory’.

The second half of the film follows more closely the conventions of the industrial process film as the narrative concludes with the shipping of these products to England and throughout the Empire. This again relates the film directly to Britain and, as with many of the Empire Marketing Board films, promotes a message of imperial trade.

Tom Rice (September 2008)