London 1971

Islington
1971
Sound
15m

Amateur film shot by Phil Munnoch, who selected various tube stations (shots
of their names only) and recorded the sights in the vicinity. The soundtrack
of narration and music was added to the film in 1992.

Old Street - the burial grounds at Bunhill Fields.

Barbican - Smithfield Market. Inside a new flat costing £60 per week (filmed
15/5/71).

Chancery Lane - Inns of Court Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn (filmed 3/4/71).

Holborn - The Old Curiosity Shop. Tennis in Lincoln Inn Fields. Sicilian
Avenue. The British Museum (filmed 8/5/71).

Aldwych - Law Courts (filmed 9/1/71).

Strand (had its own tube station outside Charing Cross Station) - The Yellow
Pages Bus advertised loudly. 'Show Boat' playing in the Strand. The Savoy.
Somerset House. The Harlow kidnap baby had at last been found. A pair of
restaurant owners pose for camera (filmed 4/9/71).

Covent Garden - the fruit and vegetable market. The Royal Opera House. Shows
'The Great Waltz' at the Drury Lane Theatre, 'The Dirtiest Show in Town' and
'No Sex Please We're British' playing at the Strand, Aldwych (filmed
27/11/71).

Leicester Square - Hoardings for 'Carnal Knowledge' at the Leicester Square
Theatre, 'Catch Me a Spy', 'Klute' and 'The Devils' both playing at the Warner
West End. Chinatown. 'And Now For Something Completely Different' showing at
the Columbia in Shaftesbury Avenue. 'The Mousetrap' playing in its 19th year.
Gay Pride marchers close to the 17th-century Goodwin's Court and its parish
lock-up (filmed 30/10/71).

Tottenham Court Road - The Scientology headquarters. Centrepoint. Soho Square.
Christmas decorations outside Bourne and Hollingsworth's department store. War
veteran buskers. The Happy Wanderers entertained (filmed 20/11/71).

Oxford Circus - Hanover Square. Danny La Rue's club. London Palladium. Police
attempting to break into a car and objecting to being filmed. Carnaby Street
(filmed 23/10/71).

Green Park - St. James's Palace. Buckingham Palace. The Mall (filmed 18/9/71).

Piccadilly Circus - Regent Street. Police removing people attempting to sit
down. 'Puppet On A Chain' showing at a cinema (filmed 11/9/71).

Trafalgar Square - traffic warden issuing a parking ticket. Charing Cross
(filmed 28/8/71).

Westminster - Queen Boadicea's statue. Houses of Parliament. Oliver Cromwell's
statue. The Jewel Tower. Downing Street, and the shortcut to Horseguards
(filmed 7/8/71).

Waterloo - The Shell Building, with views from top of building. South Bank.
Royal Festival Hall. National Film Theatre. Evening News distribution depot.
The new LWT studio under construction (filmed 31/7/71).

Lambeth North - Lambeth Palace. A new bus with its doors being tested (filmed
12/6/71).

Clapham Common - The Museum of British Transport and its old buses, trains and
trams (filmed 5/6/71).

Queer Britain

This colourful and challenging collection explores screen representations of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender lives over the past century.

British cinema boasts a long history of carefully coded queerness, but for much of the 20th century explicit depictions of gay life in drama or documentary were more or less taboo. Gay men were subject to vicious state-sanctioned persecution, while lesbians were socially ostracised and the transgender community ignored and misunderstood. Cinematic and small-screen breakthroughs in the 1950s and 60s played their part in the public debate. Finally acting on the recommendations of the Wolfenden Committee a decade earlier, the 1967 Sexual Offences Act partially decriminalised male homosexuality in England and Wales, between two men over 21, in private. As those caveats suggest, the legislation remained problematic. But it was a step forward, paving the way for further battles - some yet to be won. From early glimpses of 'queer' characters, this collection charts the path towards '67 and beyond, through responses to the AIDS crisis to diverse reflections on queer life today.