LDS church members have practically forgotten the LDS film strips. In the 1970s and 1980s they were used to share the message of the restored gospel to members and non-members of the church. They were slowly taken over by video equipment. Since the invention of DVD and streaming media, they are virtually non-existent. Libraries in church buildings might have them. Many libraries just give them away, throw them away, or give them to Deseret Industries.
Filmstrips are 35mm film frames that are projected through a simple projector and projected onto a wall or whiteboard screen. The light for the projection comes from a simple bulb. Audio was provided by a cassette tape or record, during the course of the audio a series of small beeps indicated when the slider needed to be changed. Someone had to listen to the beeps and change the frame accordingly.
Although they have lost popularity, there are still fragments of these film strips in LDS culture. The LDS Church has converted some of these film strips to videotapes and DVDs, but in very limited instances. A film strip that was made into videotape was titled I’ll Build You a Rainbow.
I’ll Build You a Rainbow begins with a montage of a boy and his mother playing together, going places together, and just hanging out. The assembly is really long. The filmstrip ends with an ambulance arriving at the boy’s house. The mother tells her son that she is going to die and that now she needs to be a big boy. The filmstrip ends with a song about how the mother will build a rainbow for her son and she will look for them in the sky.
Even though film strips are a very outdated technology, this film strip has endured in a way and the memories still remain. This particular film strip will probably be remembered for the emotional impact, even though the film is campy; most people are surprised towards the end. There are other movie strips that church members may remember, but this one tends to be an enduring classic.
Other film strips that members might be familiar with would be the stories from the Indian Seminary show, Ordination, and A Child and the Power of God, just to name a few. There really is no point in resurrecting filmstrips as a source of entertainment or instruction due to the modern equivalents being so much more superior; however, they have a cultural and nostalgic impact on church members who might remember them from their youth.
