This film is part of Free
Occupy!
Pete Postlethwaite, Bill Nighy and Julie Walters appear in this film about a four-year struggle to set up a worker’s cooperative.
Overview
Pete Postlethwaite, Bill Nighy and Julie Walters, make some of their earliest performances on film in the story of a four-year struggle to set up a worker’s cooperative at a Fisher-Bendix factory in Kirkby. Gael Dohany’s polemical and formally radical documentary recounts the passage of industrial dispute through a mixture of interviews, news reports and scenes from a play about the occupation performed by the Liverpool Everyman Theatre.
Also intercut are ‘eye-witness’ reports from similar events in Turin in 1919 and Detroit in 1936. With the use of such fictionalised interviews and its intercutting of material, the film has stylistic echoes of the work of Peter Watkins and Jean-Luc Godard, but rather than making broader political commentary Dohany is focused on the intrigue of this localised struggle. Occupy! was funded by the BFI Production Board during a brief period of mid-1970s political radicalism when the Board also funded films by London Women's Film Group, Cinema Action and the Berwick Street Collective.
Related
High Treason (sound version) High Treason (sound version)
Science Fiction 1929 68 mins
Extravagantly-mounted futuristic sci-fi, now with added sound, although still with the world's two power blocs at loggerheads.
High Treason (silent version) High Treason (silent version)
Science Fiction 1929 75 mins Silent
A terrorist plot plays out on a backdrop of towering skyscrapers, bullet-railways and silver lamé in this vintage vision of London's future.
The Tunnel The Tunnel
Science Fiction 1936 93 mins
The construction of a transatlantic tunnel linking Britain and America hits trouble in an entertaining slice of speculative fiction.
The Private Life of Don Juan The Private Life of Don Juan
Comedy 1934 87 mins
Husbands lock up their wives when the renowned Romeo returns to Seville; but the man wooing the city’s ladies is not what he seems.
A Message from Mars A Message from Mars
Science Fiction 1913 60 mins Location: London
Britain's first full-length science fiction feature has been restored by the BFI National Archive and given a new score by composer Matthew Herbert, commissioned by the BFI and the BBC.
Hedd Wyn Hedd Wyn
War 1992 115 mins Location: Trawsfynydd
The stirring story of poet Ellis Evans-Hedd Wyn, the Welsh poet posthumously awarded the Eisteddfod chair at Birkenhead in 1917 after failing to return from 1st World War trenches.
Getting it Back: The Story of Cymande - Q&A Getting it Back: The Story of Cymande - Q&A
Inside Film 2024 22 mins
The director of a documentary about British funk pioneers Cymande joins the band at BFI Southbank to talk about the film.
The West Case The West Case
Action and Adventure 1923 28 mins Silent Location: Tilbury
Plotting world domination, Devil Doctor Fu-Manchu steals plans for a new aero-torpedo in this earliest surviving thrill-a-minute serial instalment.
Enter the Scala!!! Enter the Scala!!!
Inside Film 2024 16 mins
Filmmakers Jane Giles and Ali Catterall discuss their documentary Scala!!!, revisiting the legendary and inspirational cinema venue and some of the most notorious films that screened there.
Smith Smith
Charity appeal 1939 10 mins
Long thought lost, this Powell-directed promotional short for a veteran’s charity was only rediscovered in 2003.
An Airman's Letter to His Mother An Airman's Letter to His Mother
Documentary 1941 6 mins
A poignant, stirring letter from a recently deceased pilot to his mother is read by John Gielgud.
The NHS75 Celebration The NHS75 Celebration
Short documentary 2023 3 mins
Former Bristol Poet Laureate, Miles Chambers reads a poem specially commissioned for the 75th anniversary of the NHS.