“I Think Catholics Didn't Go to the Cinema”

In his monograph on US-European struggles over the world film dominance in the 1920s until the 1950s, Selling Hollywood to the World, American historian John Trumpbour devotes a full chapter to film culture in the small kingdom of Belgium. Trumpbour writes that, although “Belgium rarely figures prominently in the annals of cinema history” and even “failed to create a commercial film industry,” the country “emerged as the European leader in organizing international action against depravity in film.” In the Roman Catholic Church’s international strategy on film, “the Belgian church stood out as the international command-and-control centre of the movement,” so that it “at times played a more central role than the US Legion of Decency.” ¹ This statement might appear a bit exaggerated, but as mentioned in the various contributions in this book (Introduction, Chapters 1, 5, 6, 7, 10), Belgian clergy like Abel Brohée and Felix Morlion did play a significant role in the creation and development of the International Catholic Organization for Cinema (OCIC), particularly when the international Catholic film organization moved from The Hague to Brussels in 1933. ² From its headquarters in the Belgian capital, OCIC functioned as an energetic pressure group, “organizing international conferences and fostering Catholic ownership and entrepreneurship in the exhibition sector.” ³