Assignment: Venezuela is a 1956 American short propaganda film. It is a fictional travelogue designed to promote working in the oil industry in Venezuela. It was directed by John H. "Jack" Tobin and is part of the Prelinger Archives, available in the public domain. It was made into a Mystery Science Theater 3000 spoof in the 1990s. Synopsis Jim is a middle-level oil engineer who is being relocated to Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela, with his family: wife Ann and two sons. He initially tries to use a Spanish pocket phrase book unsuccessfully, but is quickly greeted at Grano de Oro Airport by a company rep. Jim is taken on a tour of Maracaibo, Caracas, and Lagunillas to familiarize him with the new country; Venezuela is depicted in a positive fashion. In Maracaibo, Jim drives across the waterfront in an imported American car, and in Caracas he explores the newly built University City of Caracas, and studies Spanish intensively.:97–98 He writes letters to Ann telling her how great Venezuela is before his family joins him a few weeks later, all having learnt Spanish beforehand.:158 Production Assignment: Venezuela was produced by Sound Masters, Inc. for the Creole Petroleum Corporation (part of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey) and directed by John H. "Jack" Tobin. It was filmed on Kodachrome 16mm film with an Arriflex camera. The film is in color and 24 minutes in length, and is part of the Prelinger Archives. It is available in the public domain. Analysis The film was produced in the context of the Marcos Pérez Jiménez military dictatorship, with scholar Lisa Blackmore describing the propaganda and national image of that time as having distinct dual purposes: for Venezuelans, the Venezuelan leaders wanted to show an independent anti-capitalist nation, and for Americans involved in the oil trade they wanted to present an attractive, modern, Western nation. Blackmore writes that "this mission to confirm Venezuela's development on this basis of its embrace of the American way of life transpires clearly" in the film.:97 Scholar Miguel Tinker Salas wrote that the film was part of a practice intended to make the American employees more sympathetic to the Venezuelan locals upon arrival, and to not be too brash; he also believes it was unsuccessful in this aim. He states this is because it was only shown to employees of petroleum corporations, not their families, and was paired with extensive classes