The House in the Middle
About The House in the Middle
Three small houses stand in a row at the Nevada Test Site. The two on the ends are dirty and cluttered. The middle house is clean and freshly painted. An atomic blast hits all three. The film argues that the tidy house is the one more likely to stand.
More about The House in the Middle
The blast footage was shot at the Upshot-Knothole Encore test on May 8, 1953. The Federal Civil Defense Administration issued a black-and-white short that year. In 1954 the National Paint, Varnish and Lacquer Association, through a bureau it called the National Clean Up–Paint Up–Fix Up Bureau, issued this color version. Robert J. Enders Inc. produced the 1954 film. The National Film Preservation Foundation times that print at 12 minutes. Wikipedia says 13. It was released in 16mm Kodachrome and in black and white, with a shorter cut for television.
Themes
Background
The test was Upshot-Knothole Encore, part of the 1953 series at the Nevada site.
Making
The houses were real structures built for the May 8, 1953 shot, not models.
Preservation
The 1954 film was selected for the National Film Registry in 2001. The National Film Preservation Foundation scanned a 16mm print from the Library of Congress.
Notes
- The 1953 film and the 1954 film share the title and the same three houses.
- The 1954 sponsors are the paint trade group and the Federal Civil Defense Administration.
- The Library of Congress named the 1954 film to the National Film Registry in 2001.
- Rick Prelinger used it in the 2004 collage Panorama Ephemera.
- A copy is on Wikimedia Commons.
Scenes
- The blast hits the dirty houses and the painted one between them.
Influenced
- Panorama Ephemera (2004)
Also available
- National Film Preservation Foundation
- Library of Congress