Culture: Cinema

Baroness Bakewell Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd April 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bakewell (Lab)]

My Lords, next year the Royal Opera House expects more people to see performances of its work in the cinema than in the opera house, exceeding the 670,000 a year who visit the opera house. By cinema standards, that is small stuff; it is nothing like the audiences for blockbusters with their budgets of millions for promotion. However, it is telling because it eliminates the gulf between art and cinema that my noble friend Lord Stevenson, who introduced this debate, mentioned. Is cinema art? We do not need to ask any more because the art is in the cinemas. People are now using cinemas for a great many different kinds of programme.

The abolition of the UK Film Council in 2010 and its closure in 2011 came as a terrific shock. Why did it happen? It was done with no consultation and no understanding of why it was created in the first place. The idea was for the BFI to deal with the culture of film and for the Film Council to promote the industry. Of course, the intentions would overlap, but I know that because I served on both, as a board member of the BFI from 1992 and its chair from 1999, and then on the UK Film Council until 2002.

The UK Film Council’s tasks were commercial. Why did this Government abolish it? The council took seriously the matter of distribution—getting more people to see films and breaking the grip of the big franchises on the cinema chains. John Woodward invited distributors and cinema managers on to the council. They pioneered unusual ways of showing films. We plumbed the archives held in towns such as Manchester, Mansfield and Bradford to show archive films on giant screens in the football grounds. We negotiated schemes with multi-screen cinemas to take over those screens that were not doing good business and earmarked them for showing old movies from the BFI archive. We showed classics such as “Brief Encounter” and the Ealing comedies. All these were projects to promote film. What was the UK Film Council doing wrong?

Since then everything has moved to digital and there are loads of new ideas for showing film. The Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre are now on show in cinemas. There are also little local enterprises. An unnamed donor recently provided for the installation of the latest screen facilities in Primrose Hill library, which we had just rescued from Camden neglect. Numerous television channels run and rerun movies because the appetite for storytelling and brilliant images is insatiable. But the structure of the industry is not meeting the need. Funding for small-scale films by ambitious but unproven talent is the hardest of all to provide, while the unavailability of films in rural areas and most of our small towns is deplorable. Also, while benefiting hugely from the existence of films for their screens, the broadcasters are making a less than commensurate investment in them.

The cancellation of the UK Film Council and the 10% cut in grant in aid to the BFI has positively hindered the future progress of British film, but none the less it persists. Our creative record is outstanding and our skills are recognised worldwide. But as the January 2012 report by the noble Lord, Lord Smith, says, there is much to be done. I believe that the BFI has been loaded with too many diverse responsibilities, and although it is doing a fine job of making steady progress with its five-year plan, the burden of what it is now responsible for requires support from all sides of the industry.

I would ask the Government to back in more positive ways the many small businesses that make up the film industry in this country. Small businesses are supposed to be the sector that the Government favour most. Well, here they are. We need small cinemas in every town. I can give an example of the Aldeburgh Cinema, which I know well. It is supported by volunteers and makes a steady contribution to the year-round Aldeburgh Festival. It has its own documentary festival. It is not just small cinemas that need support, but all the small industries involved: cutting rooms, editing channels, costumiers, make-up conglomerates, set designers, script consultancies, independent producers, agents and publicity companies. All of these come together in miraculous synergy to forward our chances of winning Oscars, BAFTAs and universal recognition. Will the Government please do more to recognise success and help to uphold and further the interests of those who make it possible?