John Elston Taylor (5 October 1914 – 15 September 1992) was a British

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...

maker.John Taylor (XII)
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Early life

Born in

Kentish Town Kentish Town is an area of northwest London, England in the London Borough of Camden, immediately north of Camden Town. Less than four miles north of central London, Kentish Town has good transport connections and is situated close to the open ...

, London, on 5 October 1914, John Taylor had originally set his sights on a career in carpentry; however, shortly after finishing school he was offered a job by his sister's husband, documentary filmmaker

John Grierson John Grierson (26 April 1898 – 19 February 1972) was a pioneering Scottish documentary maker, often considered the father of British and Canadian documentary film. In 1926, Grierson coined the term "documentary" in a review of Robert J. Fl ...

.screenonline: Taylor, John (1914-1992) Biography
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Career

Taylor started work as a film assistant at the

Empire Marketing Board The Empire Marketing Board was formed in May 1926 by the Colonial Secretary Leo Amery to promote intra-Empire trade and to persuade consumers to 'Buy Empire'. It was established as a substitute for tariff reform and protectionist legislation and ...

and in the years that followed he tried his hand at such jobs as camera operator, assistant director and production assistant. Along with working on Grierson's works, Taylor also had the fortune of working alongside some of his colleagues, such as

Basil Wright Basil Wright (12 June 1907, Sutton, Surrey – 14 October 1987, Frieth, Buckinghamshire, England) was a documentary filmmaker, film historian, film critic and teacher. Biography After leaving Sherborne School, a well known independent sch ...

(''

Song of Ceylon ''The Song of Ceylon'' is a 1934 British documentary film directed by Basil Wright and produced by John Grierson for the Ceylon Tea Propaganda Board. The film was shot on location in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) at the start of 1934 and completed at the ...

'', 1934),

Robert Flaherty Robert Joseph Flaherty, (; February 16, 1884 – July 23, 1951) was an American filmmaker who directed and produced the first commercially successful feature-length documentary film, '' Nanook of the North'' (1922). The film made his reputati ...

('' Man of Aran'', 1934) and

Alberto Cavalcanti Alberto de Almeida Cavalcanti (February 6, 1897 – August 23, 1982) was a Brazilian-born film director and producer. He was often credited under the single name "Cavalcanti". Early life Cavalcanti was born in Rio de Janeiro, the son of a p ...

on several of his travel documentaries, such as ''Men of the Alps'' (1937). By the end of the 1930s, Taylor was directing films himself, including ''Smoke Menace'' (1937) and ''Londoners'' (1939). In the 1940s, Taylor began producing films which helped to expose and improve social issues: Margaret Thomson's ''Clean Milk'' (1943) helped improve the Scottish dairy industry; Alex Strasser's ''Your Children's Eyes'' (1945) showed how a child's squint could easily be corrected with a minor operation; '' Daybreak in Udi'' (d. Terry Bishop, 1949) followed the construction of a maternity hospital in a village in Eastern Nigeria. In 1952, Taylor and Leon Clore set up Countryman Films, a company which made natural history documentaries. Their greatest achievement was probably ''

The Conquest of Everest ''The Conquest of Everest'' is a 1953 British Technicolor documentary film directed by George Lowe about various expeditions to the summit of Mount Everest. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. Cameraman Tom ...

'' (d. Thomas Stobbart, 1953), a record of the successful British Everest expedition of 1953 accomplished by John Hunt, Sir Edmund Hillary and

Tenzing Norgay Tenzing Norgay (; ''tendzin norgyé''; perhaps 29 May 1914 – 9 May 1986), born Namgyal Wangdi, and also referred to as Sherpa Tenzing, was a Nepali-Indian Sherpa people, Sherpa mountaineering, mountaineer. He was one of the first tw ...

. Taylor was involved in a vast number of documentary films that became classics of the genre. He continued working up to the 1980s, producing quality documentaries on themes of social welfare and conservation.

Personal life

His wife was actress Barbara Mullen, whom he married in 1941.

Death

Taylor died on 15 September 1992, in London, England.

Selected filmography

* '' The Song of Ceylon'' (1934) - Assistant director * '' Island People'' (1940) (Producer) * ''

Letter from Aldershot ''Letter from Aldershot'' (''Une lettre d'Aldershot'') is a nine-minute 1940 Canadian documentary film, made by the National Film Board of Canada (NFB) as part of the wartime '' Canada Carries On'' series. The film was directed by John Taylor ...

'' (1940) (Director)

References

External links

*
British Entertainment History Project audio interview/john-taylor
1914 births 1992 deaths English documentary filmmakers English film producers People from Kentish Town 20th-century English businesspeople {{UK-filmmaker-stub