The Short Lived British movie revival

When Room at the Top was released in 1959, it heralding one of the most creative and stimulating periods in British cinema history. During the following few years UK film makers would bring fresh ideas to the screen - a sense of social awareness and reality that became known as kitchen sink drama. The UK at the time had been dealt a severe blow with the Suez crisis and British imperialism was on the wane. It was a time of protest and demonstrations. Young people were no longer going to accept the ancient wisdom that their elders knew best. And film-makers were quick to reflect the new mood.

At the same time as Room with a View was wowing audiences at the cinema, a group of young film students including Tony Richardson and Lindsey Anderson were showing the documentaries they had made with small grants from the British Film Institute. These films, shown at festivals under the heading Free Cinema were a conscious attempt to break away from the traditional style of documentaries and make them more personal. Apparently the standard of most of these films was low but there were the odd moments of genius and several of these young turks would become major movers in cinema in the years that followed.

Tony Richardson was the first to make a name for himself after joining with John Osbourne to form Woodfall Films. Don't Look Back in Anger (1959) starring Richard Burton as the original angry young man and The Entertainer (1960) starring the great Laurence Olivier as a washed up stand up comedian were two early hits. But it wasn't until they teamed up with a working class writer, Alan Stillitoe that they had a major hit with 1960's Saturday Night, Sunday Morning. The style of film mimicked the theatre kitchen sink style and together with Room at the Top started the British New Wave.

Star Albert Finney was virtually unknown and the style of acting was fresh and exciting - characters were complex, real people and the contemporary mood was expressed through what they said on screen. The environment in which the films took place was grim and gritty and dripping with working class realism.

Lindsey Anderson made his first feature film in 1963. This Sporting Life - one one level it explored the troubled relationship between two lovers and on the other it revealed the crass commercialism in Rugby League. It was highly praised by critics and its fragmented flashback structure has become a part of the language of cinema.

In 1963 almost a quarter of the films made in the UK dealt with contemporary working class issues - it was a vintage year for British cinema but it also spelt the beginning of the end. Ironically it was Woodfall films, who had done so much to give British films their own identity, that handed the reins back to Hollywood. Tony Richardson did a deal with United Artists to raise the budget for his next film, Tom Jones, based on the classic Henry Fielding novel. The film was a huge success and opened the floodgates for American capital to pour into British film production. The New Wave cinema with its unknown stars and lack of glamour was the first victim of the Americanisation of the UK style and gradually British cinema lost much of its native charm and became part of the transatlantic movie culture.