Film
Search the film collectionOver 5.5 million feet of film has been inspected and stored by the Archive from films made at the turn of the twentieth century to newly released productions by some of Wales' most cutting-edge directors.
As an Archive we are responsible for all the discreet elements of the conservation and archival process - we collect material, preserve and catalogue footage and provide access to the films in our care.
The film collection contains feature films, documentaries, educational films, amateur films and home movies, newsreel, animation, adverts and more. The collection reflects every aspect of Welsh life and culture including work and leisure, sport, politics and home life. Industry and agriculture, urban and rural life, travel and recreation, war, peace and protest are all reflected, often through tellingly different prisms such as fiction, newsreel and amateur film.
Some of the early material reflects the important contribution of the Welsh based film pioneers Arthur Cheetham and William Haggar to the beginnings of cinema.
It is possible to trace in the collection the developing relationship between film and the threatened Welsh language, beginning with the 1930s films of Syr Ifan ab Owen Edwards and continuing today in a steady flow of Lottery-backed features.
Whole slices of community life can be seen in many of the collections held which span a number of years - for example a fascinating group of films made by a Carmarthenshire farming family in the 1930s; snapshots of the activities of an Anglesey community from the 1950s to 1970s and a unique collection of personal accounts of life in south Wales in the 1970s and early 1980s as chartered by the Chapter Video Workshop initiative.
The ever-changing nature of culture and the arts in Wales is reflected in diverse films including the Welsh Arts Council Collection, documents of eisteddfodau through the lenses of professionals and amateurs alike, and examples of world-class animation.
The collection holds Oscar© winners and nominees, and features the work of many key Welsh filmmakers - Karl Francis, Jack Howells and Joanna Quinn, to name but a few. Contemporary short films, including award-winning works, are regularly added to the collection.
Occasionally astonishing discoveries are made, such as The Life Story of David Lloyd George (Maurice Elvey, 1918), a feature length biopic of the 'Welsh Wizard', which was suppressed before release, and disappeared for 76 years before its rediscovery and restoration by the Archive in 1994. This amazing discovery - described by film historian Kevin Brownlow as 'the find of the century' - was the direct result of a restoration by the Archive of another, amateur film of Lloyd George visiting Germany and Hitler in 1936.
We are always looking for new material to add to this important and fascinating collection. If you would like to present, deposit or donate films to the Archive to protect for future generations contact us now!