Professor of English Dr. Eric Hobson was the featured speaker at the Leesburg Public Library in Leesburg, Florida on March 6. His talk, titled “David M Newell’s 1931 Brazilian Adventure, Part 2,” focused on the pivotal role that the Florida writer, illustrator and filmmaker played in the 1931 Matto Grosso Expedition’s creation of the first documentary movie filmed on-location using sound-capture cameras. This is known as the world’s first “on-site talkie documentary.”
Hobson went on to screen the film, “Matto Grosso, the Great Brazilian Wilderness (1933).” The film was prefaced by an introductory presentation and followed by a moderated question-and-answer session.
