''Flying Padre'' is a 1951 short subject black-and-white

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 ...

. It is the second film directed by Stanley Kubrick. The film is nine minutes long and was completed shortly after Kubrick had completed his first film for

RKO RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheu ...

, the short subject '' Day of the Fight'' (1951). The studio offered him a follow-up project for their Screenliner series.Stafford, Jeff
"Articles: 'Flying Padre' (1951)."
''TCM'', 2019. Retrieved: June 13, 2019.

Synopsis

The subject of ''Flying Padre'' is a

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in partic ...

in rural

New Mexico ) , population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano) , seat = Santa Fe , LargestCity = Albuquerque , LargestMetro = Tiguex , OfficialLang = None , Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ke ...

, Reverend Fred Stadtmueller. Known to his parishioners as the "Flying Padre", his 4,000-square mile

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one o ...

is so large, he uses a

Piper Cub The Piper J-3 Cub is an American light aircraft that was built between 1938 and 1947 by Piper Aircraft. The aircraft has a simple, lightweight design which gives it good low-speed handling properties and short-field performance. The Cub is P ...

aircraft (named the ''Spirit of St. Joseph'') to travel from one isolated settlement to another. The film shows two days in his daily life, with the Reverend providing spiritual guidance, saying a Funeral Mass, and other glimpses of his life such as his breakfast routine at the parish house. His days include a funeral service for a ranch hand, and counseling of two young parishioners who have been quarrelling. In the climax of the film. the "Flying Padre" also operated as an impromptu

air ambulance Air medical services is a comprehensive term covering the use of air transportation, aeroplane or helicopter, to move patients to and from healthcare facilities and accident scenes. Personnel provide comprehensive prehospital and emergency and cri ...

by flying a sick child and his mother to hospital.

Cast

Bob Hite Robert Ernest Hite (February 26, 1943 – April 5, 1981) was the co-lead vocalist of the American blues and rock band Canned Heat, from 1965 to his death in 1981. His nickname was "The Bear". Biography Hite was introduced to Alan Wils ...

as Himself - Narrator (voice) * Reverend Fred Stadtmueller as Himself * Pedro as Himself

Production

After Kubrick sold his first short film, the self-financed '' Day of the Fight'', to RKO in 1951 for $4,000 (pocketing a $100 profit), the company advanced the 23-year-old filmmaker money to make a follow-up project, a documentary short for their ''Pathe Screenliner'' series which specialized in short human-interest documentaries. He originally wanted to call the film ''Sky Pilot'' but the studio did not like the title."Stanley Kubrick: The Master Filmmaker - Biography/Chronology."
''prodigy.com'', July 12, 2009. ''Flying Padre'' is narrated by

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

announcer

Reception

In an interview in 1969, Kubrick referred to ''Flying Padre'' as a "silly thing".Gelmis, Joseph
"An Interview With Stanley Kubrick (1969)
excerpted from ''The Film Director as Superstar'', 1970, p. 293. ''Flying Padre'', however, was an important landmark in his budding career as a filmmaker. "It was at this point that I formally quit my job at ''Look'' to work full time on filmmaking," Kubrick stated in an interview."

References

Notes

Citations

Bibliography

* Gelmis, Joseph. ''The Film Director as Superstar''. New York: Doubleday, 1970. .

External links

* * *

' a
Kubrick: Master Filmmaker
*

' a
Kubrick Multimedia Film Guide

(Translated from French to English by Google)
The Kubrick Site
{{Stanley Kubrick 1951 films American short documentary films American aviation films American black-and-white films Documentary films about aviation Films directed by Stanley Kubrick RKO Pictures short films 1950s short documentary films 1951 documentary films Films scored by Nathaniel Shilkret 1950s English-language films 1950s American films