culture
abovE left: Well-met – Jim Carter, Michael Palin and Alan Bennett with Richard Griffiths at the Bradford International Film Festival in 2008. ABOVE RIGHT: The National Media Museum is one of the UK’s most visited museums. LEFT: Television pioneer John Logie Baird with equipment which is on display at the National Media Museum.
Film. This permanent title bestows international recognition on Bradford as a world centre for film because of the city’s dedicated film heritage, its inspirational locations and its many celebrations of the moving image through the city’s annual film festivals. Directors have long been inspired by the area’s versatility: its juxtaposition of blustery moors with a thriving, bustling inner city. Films made in Bradford include Billy Liar, The Railway Children, LA Without A Map and Monty Python’s The Meaning Of Life. More recently, parts of The King’s Speech were filmed in the city as well as many TV productions, including Frost, the Red Riding trilogy, Spooks Code 9, The Syndicate and scenes for Coronation Street and Emmerdale. In 2012, Director of Bradford city of Film, David Wilson announced that Bradford University would fund a programme of research into the effectiveness of film literacy in raising achievement levels in Bradford’s schools. He said: “The pilot will be extended to
encourage all primary schools initially, with a number of secondary schools coming on board throughout 2013 and 2014.” The area’s connection with film led to the concept of a national media museum in the city which first opened in 1983 as the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, later becoming the National Media Museum (NMM) and one of the country’s most visited museums outside of London. As well as being the site of the UK’s first IMAX cinema, the museum is home to more than 3.5 million historically significant items, including those from the fields of photography, cinematography, television, animation, new media and film. The NMM recently hit the headlines when the world’s first colour footage was found in the archives. The BBC described the discovery of the films, which date from 1902 and were discovered lying in an old tin, as a “breakthrough in film history”. Nestled among the collection are three other pivotal firsts: the world’s earliest known surviving negative, the earliest television ➔
winter 2012
Bradford 15