King Coal

To coincide with the King Coal film and television season at BFI Southbank in September, we are showing a selection of short films and extracts from the BFI National Archive exploring a century of coalmining on screen. These titles and many more can be seen as part of the King Coal project at BFI Southbank and around the UK.

King Coal (1948) - 3 mins
Director and animator: Jules Pinschewer
King Coal is roused from his underground kingdom to see the factories and homes of Britain calling out for more coal. He sees that they get it.

Coal Face (1935) extract - 2:05 mins
Dir. Alberto Cavalcanti. GPO Film Unit
Breakthrough film with remarkably inventive use of sound in combination with visual image. The verse in this film was written by W.H. Auden. The commentary was spoken by W.H. Auden and Montague Salter, and the music is by Benjamin Britten.

Songs of the Coalfield (1957) - 2 mins
NCB Film Unit
"The Sandgate Nursing Song", a mining ballad from Newcastle, sung by Ewan MacColl and Isla Cameron.

Big Job (1965) - 1 min
NCB Film Unit
Recruitment advertisement for miners, showing how coal makes the 1960s swing.

Miners (1976) extract - 3 mins
Dir. Peter Pickering. NCB Film Unit
How miners live and work, as recounted in their own words and in the opinions of their wives, filmed in Bagworth, Leicestershire.

40 Years On (1978) extract - 1 min
NCB Film Unit
This closing extract sums up the key role of coal in the UK: "We shall continue to win our energy from underground not only for the next 40 years but for the next 400."

Not Just Tea and Sandwiches (1984) extract - 1:14 mins
Miners' Campaign Video Tape
Striking miners' wives speak out.

Meet the People (The Price of Coal) (1977) extract - 1:40 mins
Dir. Ken Loach. BBC
Director Ken Loach is reunited with playwright Barry Hines and producer Tony Garnett for the first time since they worked together on Kes. Meet the People is a television play about the comic consequences of the announcement of a royal visit to Milton Colliery in Yorkshire. Filmed on location at the disused Thorpe Hesley pit, it stars four Northern comics, Jackie Shinn, Duggie Brown, Stan Richards and Bobby Knutt as working men with a lot on their plates.

The Battle of Orgreave (2001) extract - 2 mins
Dir. Mike Figgis
A film of the re-enactment conceived by artist Jeremy Deller of one of the most violent clashes between striking miners and police during the Miners' Strike in the streets and fields of Orgreave, South Yorkshire. Figgis' hour-long film relives this important day, which made social and political history, combining the re-enactment with live footage of the actual event.

Balletomines (Mining Review 7th Year No 12) (1954) - 4 mins
Eight 'husky' miners from the West Riding Colliery, resplendent in tutus perform Delibes' Coppelia for charity at Normanton Central Town Club, Yorkshire.