“MOVIE TONIGHT​—NO CHARGE”

One reason for this flourishing interest was the film The New World Society in Action.e This film​—the first produced by the organization since the “Photo-Drama of Creation” nearly 40 years earlier—​highlighted the global preaching and printing work and showed how Jehovah’s Witnesses are organized. During a four-week visit to American Samoa in 1955, Len showed the film 15 times, to a total audience of 3,227 people, an average of 215 per showing.

“Before each showing,” recalls Len, “we advertised the film by driving through the villages tossing out leaflets to everybody we passed. At the same time, we shouted out, ‘Movie tonight​—no charge,’ along with the name of the village where it would be screened.”

The film made a huge impression on the population. After each showing, audiences wanted to learn more about Jehovah’s Witnesses and their teachings. Rather than wait for the Witnesses to return, many interested people came directly to the missionary home, where missionaries conducted several studies in different parts of the home at the same time. When one group left, another took their place. “Years later,” remembers Ron Sellars, “people still associated Jehovah’s Witnesses with the wonderful things they had seen in that film.”