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Victim: Brave and Bitter

Author: 
M Spence
Post date: 
30 Jul 2017 - 9:52pm

 

It’s not often that a film or TV programme has a direct, measurable political impact, and perhaps today, with the sheer volume of audio-visual content coming at us from all directions, it can’t happen. But once upon a time it could, and here in Britain we have two celebrated examples from the ‘60s: the Tony Garnett / Ken Loach 1966 TV play Cathy Come Home highlighted the reality of homelessness and helped launch the charity Shelter; and the Basil Dearden / Michael Relph 1961 film Victim helped pave the way for the 1967 Sexual Offences Act and the decriminalisation of homosexuality. 

Live from Lime Grove: Michael Bond before Paddington Bear

Author: 
M Spence
Post date: 
17 Jul 2017 - 8:32pm

Michael Bond passed away three weeks ago, but when I visited the statue of Paddington Bear at Paddington Station yesterday, it was still an intimate little shrine, festooned with flowers and jars of marmalade. There is definitely a ‘national treasure’ here somewhere, but I’m not entirely clear whether it’s Paddington Bear or Michael Bond. Or maybe a sort of composite of them both?

 

Although our memories of Michael today are inseparable from the figure of Paddington, there was a Michael before Paddington. When A Bear Called Paddington was published in 1958, Michael was a Cameraman at the BBC studios in Lime Grove. He had been working for the BBC for over a decade, and he would continue to work for them for almost another decade before finally deciding to become a full-time writer.

 

Roger Moore's Bond movies

Author: 
M Spence
Post date: 
10 Jun 2017 - 4:14pm

 

The death of Roger Moore last month triggered a wave of nostalgia, with the main focus inevitably on his seven film performances as James Bond. His were the funniest and silliest of the Bond movies. The plots, the villains, the fights, the gadgets, the seductions, were classic kitsch: cheesy and tacky, yet knowing and ironic. And Moore, with his matinee idol looks and oh-so-expressive eyebrow, was just the man to personify the package, a mocking celebration of Britain’s ‘70s and ‘80s delusions about itself. And the fans loved him for it. Maybe it was rubbish, but it was our rubbish.

BEHP to collaborate on major BBC/Sussex University Project

Tags: 
BBC
Sussex University

The BEHP is one of a number of key partners contributing to a major new project, BBC Connected Histories, that will tell the story of the BBC directly through the voices of the people who worked there. 

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Girls Like Us: Women Editors in British Film

Author: 
M Spence
Post date: 
8 May 2017 - 10:03pm

The ‘Girls Like Us: British Women and WWII Cinema’ season continues at the National Film Theatre in May with more great films on offer. As in April, and despite the fact that these 1940s films have been selected for their strong female content, all of them were directed by men. But, also as in April, if we look more closely we will still find women in key roles not just on screen but also behind the camera.

The Latest Batch of History Project Interviews.

The latest batch of History Project interviews uploaded to our website this month include:

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The Latest Batch of History Project Interviews

Author: 
Mike Dick
Post date: 
20 Apr 2017 - 11:41am

The latest batch of History Project interviews uploaded to our website this month include:

Interview number 532  Peter Graham Scott  Peter was an film producer, film director and screenwriter. One of the producers and directors who shaped British television drama in its formative years, He was a key figure in television drama in the seventies and eighties and was responsible for top rating series including The Avengers, Mogul, The Troubleshooters, and, most successfully, The Onedin Line, which ran for 9 years. He was much admired by fellow directors as well as actors and was renowned for his film editing skills, which he had honed in the forties while working for J Arthur Rank on films such as Brighton Rock.

Girls Like Us: Carmen Dillon, Art Director

Author: 
M Spence
Post date: 
3 Apr 2017 - 5:27pm

 

In April and May 2017 the National Film Theatre is running a season of films under the heading'Girls Like Us: British Women and WWII Cinema'. There are some real treasures here. Some of the April titles – Went the Day Well?, Millions Like Us, In Which We Serve – are relatively well-known. But – to my enduring shame, I’m sure - I have never seen Demi-Paradise, or The Gentle Sex, or Unpublished Story. I can’t wait.

The History Project Celebrates the 30th Anniversary of its First Interview

Monday 6th March 2017

The British Entertainment History Project celebrated the 30th Anniversary of the recording its first interview with DoP Eric Cross on March 6th 1987. Guest of honour was Roy Fowler who founded the ACCT History Project all those years ago. Roy celebrates his 90th birthday today - the 10th March 2017.   

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Nice and Quiet? Ken Russell's 'The Boy Friend' (1971)

Author: 
M Spence
Post date: 
4 Mar 2017 - 4:47pm

This month – March 2017 – the National Film Theatre is showcasing Ken Russell’s 1971 production of The Boy Friend, focusing in particular on the production design and costume design that gave it its particular 1920s/1960s crossover look.

The Boy Friend sits right in the middle of Russell’s purple patch, stretching from the mid-60s to the mid-70s, when he produced much of his most enduring work. In the early 1960s he was in television, producing idiosyncratic documentaries, including several on composers – Bartok, Debussy, Prokoviev - for the BBC ‘Monitor’ series. From 1967 he moved into film with Billion Dollar Brain, followed in 1969 by Women In Love which won him an Oscar nomination, and Glenda Jackson an Oscar.