ABSTRACT
Given OCIC’s location in Brussels, the fact that Belgian Catholics played a prominent role in the international Catholic film movement was not entirely surprising. During the inter-war years, Belgians had taken leading roles in various other policy arenas in order to tighten international Catholic collaboration, 4 while in the field of cinema, Catholics in Belgium had shown a particularly fervent and pragmatic engagement with cinema. Via a broad network of Catholic organizations and guided by the militant spirit of Catholic Action (see Introduction), Belgian Catholics managed to become active in an exceptionally wide range of levels in the local film culture, mainly from the 1920s onwards and lasting until the 1960s. They succeeded in building a network of Catholic-inspired activities, including film distribution, exhibition, criticism, running a documentation center and a film classification board-all under the umbrella of the Catholic Film
Action (CFA). 5 In addition to the overall aim of ‘purifying’ or moralizing cinema according to Catholic beliefs and morality, the CFA ultimately tried to create a segregated viewing pattern among the community of Catholic cinema-goers.
