This first co-production between the GDR and Great Britain is intended to contribute to an understanding of the situation and attitudes of millions of working people in opposing social orders. Using the example of shipyard workers, fishermen, the brigade and family of a trade union active cook and...
Documentation of the 1984 Chesterfield by-election, which saw Tony Benn returned to parliament, and the early days of the Miners’ Strike which began shortly after.
Betty and her daughter Corinna are introduced to the harsh seacoaling way of life by Ray, an ex-seacoaler returning from a job with ICI. His offer of a caravan on a cliff top and promises of the Klondyke that awaits them at least seem preferable to the violent marriage she has left behind. The film...
A feature drama set in the declining fishing industry in North Shields, the film centres on the upheaval caused in a traditional fishing community by the unexpected arrival of a young woman.
The last pits have closed, the redundancy money has been spent and a family is in crisis. 70 year old pigeon man Arthur Elliott is losing his allotment to the local authority’s coastal redevelopment scheme. Working as a trumpeter, teacher, club singer and club act agent, his son, 40 year old...
Like many women active during the miners' strike, May Murton (Charlie Hardwick) has been left to clean up the mess. The closure of the pit, a failed marriage and the community’s disintegration have shattered both her personal and political beliefs. Her teenage children (Darren Bell and Katja...
Combines footage of the 100th Durham Miner's Gala held in 1983, with extracts from a miners' weekend school held two months later, to raise the central issues that were of concern to the mineworkers' union during the lead up to the national strike of 1984.
A partly dramatised documentary built around Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen’s photographs of the Newcastle terraced community, demolished to make way for the Byker Wall. Konttinen, a founder member of the Amber collective moved to Byker when the group came to NE England in 1969. She lived there until...
Set in the harness racing fraternity, this feature drama explores the conflict between urban and rural values and the relationship between an estranged father and son.
T. Dan Smith: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Utopia
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An experimental mix of thriller and documentary exploring the scandal centred on the one-time Newcastle Council Leader, aka The Mouth of the Tyne, who was sentenced to six years imprisonment in 1974 for corruption. A dynamic and visionary politician, Smith collaborated closely as Amber unpicked the...
A richly lyrical documentary celebration of the vibrant beach life in the North East of England, constructed entirely out of Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen's black & white photographs.
Feelings of fear and isolation felt by an elderly woman navigating the new urban environments that had increasingly replaced traditional working class communities in the 60s, 70s and 80s.
The Jellyfish employs a variety of experimental approaches, combining stop-motion and pixilation techniques, freely mixing black and white photography of beach landscapes, objects and people – along with some drawings – to build a poetic, very textured montage, eliding the real and the surreal,...
Tynesiders speak up - three talk to camera about their lives. Jim, a union activist; Betty, a housewife; and Arthur, a retired fish quay worker, talk about their daily struggles and their leisure time. The interviews are linked by a visual journey along the River Tyne.
A meditation on a lost era and the regenerative power of the sea, Song For Billy grew out of the haunting photographs of Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen’s photography project The Coal Coast. Tracing the scattered clues of England’s post-industrial northern coastline, with coal mining seams extending...
Portrait of Laurie Wheatley, a former plasterer with a life long interest in photography, drawing, painting and sculpture. Follows the production of his first ever life-size sculpture - a figure in plaster depicting a shipyard welder, and using the 'master-mould' process.
