Free Cinema

Film Description

A collection of films from the groundbreaking 'free cinema' movement, the term coined by Lindsay Anderson in 1956. The films were 'free' in the sense that they were made outside the framework of the film industry, and that their statements were personal. These films had in common the conditions of their production (very low budget, unpaid crew) and the equipment they employed (hand-held 16mm cameras) but also a style and attitude. Mostly funded by the British Film Institute's Experimental Film Fund, they featured ordinary, mostly working-class people at work and play, displaying a rare sympathy and respect, and a self-consciously poetic style. They also shared an experimental approach to sound, avoiding narration and imaginatively counterpointing sound and image. The collection contains the films O Dreamland (Anderson, 1953), Momma Don't Allow (Reisz & Richardson, 1955), Together (Mazzetti, 1956), Wakefield Express (Anderson, 1952), Nice Time (Tanner & Goretta, 1957), The Singing Street (McIsaac, 1952), Everyday Except Christmas (Anderson, 1957), Refuge England (Vas,1959), Enginemen (Grigsby, 1959), We Are The Lambeth Boys (Reisz, 1959), Food For A Blush (Russell, 1955), One Potato, Two Potato, The Vanishing Street, Tomorrow's Saturday, Gala Day and March To Aldermaston. The Gala Day Notes from the original 1956 free cinema programme state the following: No film can be too personal. The image speaks. Sounds amplifies and comments. Size is irrelevant. Perfection is not an aim. An attitude means a style. A style means an attitude.

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