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Academic Projects and Research Work Using the Archive
The bfi NFTVA is used by hundreds of academic researchers and students
every month from all academic backgrounds, researching a wide variety
of subjects. Research activities usually include viewing particular film
and television titles in the context of investigations on such subjects
as the work of a specific film-maker, the nature of particular genres
and the representations of either particular subjects or eras.
The Mitchell & Kenyon Research Project
The
Mitchell & Kenyon Collection consists of 800 non fiction titles
produced between 1900-1913 which has survived as nitrate negatives. This
extraordinary actuality footage is a vivid and unparalleled social record
of early 20th Century British life, featuring street and transport scenes,
sporting events, parades, local industries – ordinary people in
everyday situations. The geographical spread of the material encompasses
Lancashire, Yorkshire, the Midlands, Scotland, Ireland, the North East,
Bristol and North Wales.
The bfi and University of Sheffield formed a partnership which combines
the archiving and restoration of the films with a proactive research programme.
Some 800 films needed to be dated, contextualised and identified and their
content revealed. The collection represents the most important recent
discovery in the field of early British cinema history. It is a unique
document relating to a single, regional company and in many senses is
of equal national significance to the Lumiere and Gaumont archives in
France and the Edison material in the USA.
Although the role of the travelling showmen in the exhibition of early
film has been examined in the past decade, particular emphasis has been
placed on the cinematograph show and its importance as a performance venue.
Now, however, for the first time in the United Kingdom a body of films
can be researched in the context of local exhibition, demonstrating direct
links between commissioners, the audience and the development of the film
programme. This will raise questions about how the audience and reception
of these films may have directly affected the films, and what consequence
this had for the evolution and development of film as a medium in the
Edwardian period.
The
National Fairground Archive, working closely with the bfi, undertook
to research and investigate the contextual supporting evidence within
the holdings of the NFA, and the relevant local libraries, in order to
provide accurate dates and venues for the commissioning and exhibitions
of these films. Route books held at the National Fairground Archive reveal
the date of the fair and the showmen who attended the event, and material
in local newspapers often contains descriptions of the films. When combined
with the visual cataloguing of the films’ content by the Cataloguing
Department at the bfi, this will be a preliminary analysis of the films
commissioned by travelling showmen, and an evaluation on how the act of
commissioning, directly influenced and ultimately affected the type of
films produced from 1900 onwards. This research reveals a dynamic model
of interaction and participation between the two businesses, as opposed
to the more traditional view of the showmen as purely itinerant exhibitors
whose role was purely that of precursors to permanent cinema exhibition.
The films themselves represent vital socio-historical potential, and are
without equal in this period in the United Kingdom. They will provide
additional scope for study from a number of angles within the context
of social and local history, entertainment, performance studies, and will
be of interest to the wider non-film and academic community.
The British Film Institute and the BBC have collaborated on bringing
this fascinating material onto the screen with a three-part television
series, The
Lost World of Mitchell & Kenyon, which was broadcasted on BBC
Two in January. Presented by Dan Cruickshank, the series opens up our
past and includes interviews with descendents of some of those featured
in the footage, who are seeing their ancestors on film for the first time.
It also boasts a world exclusive: the first ever film of Manchester United.
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