Documentaries 50/60

LA CONQUÊTE DU FROID (Conquering the cold)

Jean VIDAL
1951
Duration : 26'
Format : 16 mm., DVCam, Béta SP
Black & white
Distribution : Planéte
Scriptwriter : Jean VIDAL & Jean-Pierre VIVET
Producer : ARMOR Films - Fred ORAIN
Country France
With Anouk FERJAC, SELDOW
Music Jean MARTINON
Picture Jacques MANIER
With the participation of Centre National de la Cinématographie
Prize list Selected at XIII° Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematographica - Mostra del Film Scientifico e del Documentario d'Arte - Venise - 1952
Archive footage - Haree running in the snow,
- Doe and herd in the snowy woods,
- Ice-making plant: ice loaves
- Unloading a banana cargo ship,
- Opening a chestnut on a chestnut tree,
- Slaughterhouse freezing tunnel and animal carcasses
- Refrigerated rail transport: liquid, food,
- Storage of goods in refrigerated containers,
- Household filling its refrigerator,
- Refrigeration of collected blood,
- Experiments with cold, freezing a glove, a rose

For thousands of years, hostile to man and beast alike, the cold was nothing more than a natural scourge linked to the eternal return of winter. In the course of the last century, the liquefaction of certain gases made it possible to produce artificial cold, the useful and beneficial role of which has continued to assert itself in all areas ever since. Low temperatures, evoked in the form of a journey into dreamland, provide an opportunity to present some curious experiments in which science seems to have something in common with magic.