Public Information Films (known as PIFs) are a series of government commissioned short films, shown during television advertising breaks in the UK. The US equivalent is the Public Service Announcement (PSAs).
The films are created to advise the general public on what to do in a particular situations. This ranges over a 'multitude' of circumstances, such as crossing the road, or not talking to strangers etc. PIFs can project a range of topics including safety, animal cruelty, protecting the environment, crime prevention and simple advice films about voting at elections, as an example, global warming, drugs and effects, endangered animals, reduce reuse recycle, bullying.
Often many of these films were aimed at children as a target audience and were shown during breaks in children's programmes during holidays and at weekends. "The general low-budget quality and the infamous static "crackle" before them gave them a Hammer Horror style aura. Some of them were quite terrifying and remained ingrained in the child's psyche well into adulthood, others were quite humorous and used comedy to show the dangers or ridicule the folly of those who ignore them" (Joe and Petunia are a good example of a comic PIF, which was also recently updated - see the ipod!).
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