Terence Fisher and British Science Fiction Cinema

Terence Fisher is a major figure in British cinema of the 1950s and 1960s whose work has been written about a number of film historians including David Pirie and Peter Hutchings. However, this academic work has largely concentrated on Fisher’s popular and influential Gothic horror films made for Hammer studios. His early work of the 1950s in the crime and science fiction genres has often been neglected as it does not fit in the horror category with which he is usually associated. This essay is the first to consider the five science fiction films which Fisher made during this period. The focus is twofold. Firstly, the essay traces the authorial characteristics which typify his work and shows how these are manifest in the films under consideration. Secondly, in placing the films within the wider context of British science fiction of the post-war era, consideration can be given to political and historical discourses within the work. The latter allows for a detailed discussion of the impact of the Cold War on British culture as British science fiction, and Fisher’s work specifically responded directly to the public anxieties produced by the political situation of the period. A number of British science fiction film and novels provide evidence of this and the approach offers a fruitful way to examine Fisher’s films. The essay appears in a relatively new journal but one which has already established itself as the leading publication on the genre in the UK, offering an alternative view to more established publications from the US. The essay contributes to recent attempts to revisit the existing science fiction cannon and explore previously neglected work, as well as adding to the broader discussion of the 1950s and 1960s as crucial periods of radical change in recent British cultural history

Stanley Baker: A Life in Film

Stanley Baker: A Life in Film (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2008) This is the first published academic study of the leading Welsh film star and producer Stanley Baker. The book makes use of extensive primary research including interviews with his widow, family members and collaborators, as well as archives and historical documents to provide a detailed assessment of his life and work. Baker’s career arc, from impoverished childhood in the Welsh mining valleys to international success as star and producer of Zulu (1964), allows for an exploration of a range of issues relating to class, national identity and gender. These are explored through the specifics of his life and his representation of these themes on screen. The book also considers his role within film production in the 1960s and 1970s when he established his own independent company and was then involved in the takeover of British Lion. Baker’s public role within Welsh culture, including his involvement in the creation of HTV, is assessed. As well as examining the importance of his film work in its own right, the book considers Baker’s significance to the wider culture of Wales through his articulation of a particular form of Welsh masculinity

Tony Richardson

This monograph on Tony Richardson is the first comprehensive study devoted entirely to work of this significant director. Richardson worked in feature films, theatre and television over a period of more than thirty years from the mid 1950s to the early 1990s. He was a key figure in the radical cultural change which took place in the arts in the Britain in the late 1950s referred to by historians as the British New Wave. In particular, his original theatrical production of John Osborne’s Look Back in Anger is widely regarded as the most influential theatrical event of its time. The study reassesses his crucial contribution to the New Wave, which brought a greater realism to British films and drama, as well as foregrounding topical issues such as abortion or race relations. The study also examines his work in the context of the 1960s, an era of substantial social change in Britain. During this time he was regarded as a key cultural figure, winning the Oscar as Best Director in 1964 for Tom Jones. The study moves on to examine his later neglected films from the 1970s, and his work for television in the 1980s. Richardson’s career is placed against the backdrop of historical change in Britain and the restructuring of the British film industry, and Richardson’s working relationship with a number of other key creative figures is also considered. The book contributes to key debates which have taken place over the last ten years within the study of British cinema regarding the significance of the New Wave and its impact on British film culture. It also sheds light on a wider debate instigated by historians such Arthur Marwick and taken up by Dominic Sandbrook regarding the nature of the cultural change which took place between 1955 and 1975 in Britain

Creativity and commerce: Michael Klinger and new film history

The crisis in film studies and history concerning their legitimacy and objectives has provoked a reinvigoration of scholarly energy in historical enquiry. 'New film history' attempts to address the concerns of historians and film scholars by working self-reflexively with an expanded range of sources and a wider conception of 'film' as a dynamic set of processes rather than a series of texts. The practice of new film history is here exemplified through a detailed case study of the independent British producer Michael Klinger (active 1961-87) with a specific focus on his unsuccessful attempt to produce a war film, Green Beach, based on a memoir of the Dieppe raid (August 1942). This case study demonstrates the importance of analysing the producer's role in understanding the complexities of film-making, the continual struggle to balance the competing demands of creativity and commerce. In addition, its subject matter - an undercover raid and a Jewish hero - disturbed the dominant myths concerning the Second World War, creating what turned out to be intractable ideological as well as financial problems. The paper concludes that the concerns of film historians need to engage with broader cultural and social histories. © 2010 Taylor & Francis

Seventies British Cinema

Seventies British Cinema (London: Palgrave-Macmillan/British Film Institute 2008) This is the first published academic study focusing exclusively on British cinema in the 1970s. The book developed out of increasing interest that has grown in the field of British historical film studies on this topic, partly in recognition that it remained an under-researched area. This led to two conferences, one at Exeter University and the second at Portsmouth University in 2007-08, which sought to open out the area; I took part in both events. As editor of the volume, I was responsible for bringing together some of the leading figures working on film history in the UK including Professor James Chapman of Leicester University and Professor Sarah Street of Bristol University, along with international scholars like Professor Wheeler Winston Dixon of the University of Nebraska. In addition to editing the book, I provided the introduction, which places the development of British cinema in the 1970s against the broader socio-economic background of the period, as well as a chapter looking at the reworking of the mythology of James Bond in films of the decade. The book was significant is starting a formal academic debate regarding British film culture in the 1970s and has been followed by two further edited collections, one of which I also contributed to

Constructions of masculinity in 1960s British cinema

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