Development Areas

Series

Series Name

This Modern Age

Issue

Issue No.

9

Date Released

May 1947

Length of issue (in feet)

1854

Stories in this Issue:

1. 1Development Areas

Story

Story No. within this Issue

1 / 1

Summary

BFI synopsis: A survey of the depressed areas of the 1930s, concentrating on those in the N.E. of England. Rl.1 Industrial South Wales, N.E. England - the river Tyne, Durham and S.W. Scotland - the Clyde, Renfrew and Dunbarton. Map of Britain showing development areas. Coal in trucks, steel being made, docks, ships, whilst commentary gives production statistics on the coal, steel and shipping industries. The situation after World War I is explained. A map shows the unemployment areas. The N.E. area is taken as an example - shots of railway yards, steam engines, pits, factories and shipyards closed down, decaying tenement houses, families searching for coal on slag heaps, men standing idle on the streets. Depression also hits the United States - people in food queues, Franklin Roosevelt making his speech as elected President. Unemployed men standing on streets in Germany. Hitler is elected Chancellor. In England, during the 1930s hunger marches are held. The Jarrow petition marching to London. Closed-down factories and shipyards. Social services are set up - men playing dominoes at a club, mending shoes, looking after smallholds. Stockton-on-Tees. The building where the first railway was planned. The Mayor and councillors meet with industrialists to persuade them to build new factories. Factories being built, men going back to work. World War II breaks out; men return to work in munitions factories. Aeroplanes and battleships. Workmen discuss whether a slump would follow World War II. In 1945, the Distribution of Industry Act became law. Westminster - commentary explains the powers given to the Board of Trade. The planning room at the Board of Trade. Licences are granted to industrialists to build where unemployed labour exists. New factories, some of which are designed to employ the war-disabled. Existing buildings are converted into factories. Munition factories are converted. Final shots of smoking factories, machines in use and men at work.

Researcher Comments

Trade shown on 28 May 1947.

Keywords

Economics; Industry and manufacture; War damage; Employment

Written sources

British Film Institute Databases   Used for synopsis
Documentary News Letter   Vol.6 No.58 August-September 1947, p118 -119.
Enticknap, Leo. The Non-Fiction Film in Britain, 1945-1951 unpublished PhD thesis   p254.

Credits:

Producer

James Lansdale Hodson

Production Co.

This Modern Age, Ltd.

Length of story (in feet)

1854

This series is held by:

Film Archive

Name

British Film Institute (BFI)

Email

For BFI National Archive enquiries:
nonfictioncurators@bfi.org.uk
For commercial/footage reuse enquiries:
footage.films@bfi.org.uk

Web

http://collections-search.bfi.org.uk/web

Phone

020 7255 1444

Fax

020 7580 7503

Address

21 Stephen Street
London W1T 1LN

Notes

The BFI National Archive also preserves the original nitrate film copies of British Movietone News, British Paramount News, Empire News Bulletin, Gaumont British News, Gaumont Graphic, Gaumont Sound News and Universal News (the World War II years are covered by the Imperial War Museum).

Series held

View all series held by British Film Institute (BFI)