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Poster - Movietone News, Melbourne Cup Special, 1940s Reg. No: HT 1185

Summary:: Poster issued by Movietone News to advertise their newsreel showing the running of the Melbourne Cup. In the days before television, these posters would have been displayed at cinemas around Australia, to entice audiences to rush along and see the race on the big screen.
Description:: Colour poster printed on a large sheet of white paper, showing a group of horses passing a winning post surrounded by bold text printed in white, yellow and red. The printer's details are printed in the bottom right hand corner of the white border. Creases show where the poster was originally folded into four.
Statement Of Significance:: This visually striking piece of ephemera has major historical significance in terms of the Phar Lap Collection. Even though it was produced roughly ten years after the champion died it nevertheless communicates the point that newsreel footage of the Melbourne Cup was a major 'crowd puller' at cinemas around the country in this era. The first talkie newsreel of the Melbourne Cup was made of the 1930 event, won by Phar Lap. Phar Lap fans greatly enjoyed the opportunity to see the champion win Australia's biggest race. Talkie newsreels were rather like the television news of their day.

Competition between Fox Movietone News and Cinesound to be the first to run the Melbourne Cup story became the stuff of legend in the 1930s. By the mid 1930s the film was being developed on a plane bound for Sydney. The event would be shown on Sydney cinemas within several hours.

Discipline:	History
Dimensions:	101.5 cm (Height), 76.5 cm (Width)

More information

Tagged with:	horse racing, films, advertising, melbourne cup racing carnival, cinema
Themes this item is part of:	Domestic & Community Life Collection, Leisure Collection, Phar Lap Collection
Primary Classification:	SPORT
Secondary Classification:	Horse Racing
Tertiary Classification:	prints
Inscriptions:	Printed on front: Movietone/ News/ MELBOURNE CUP/ Special/ F. CUNNINGHAME & CO. PTY LTD
Publisher:	Movietone News, Australia, 1940-1950
Printer:	F. Cunninghame & Co., Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 1940-1950
References:	Graham Shirley, the film historian, has written about the competition between Movietone News and Cinesound to be the first to show film of the Melbourne Cup in Sydney. See, for instance: Graham Shirley and Brian Adams 'Australian Cinema - The first Eighty Years', (Angus and Robertson/Currency Press, Sydney, 1983). Regarding Phar Lap as media star see: Eddie Butler-Bowdon, 'The Media Star', pp.169-178, in the book 'Phar Lap', eds. G Armstrong and P Thompson, Allen and Unwin, 2000