Get help now Watch Apply
SearchApply or register interestContactGet help now
A crew films on a terraced street, camera low on a slider beside a reflector and an actor by a tree.

Learn · Essay · In the tradition of

In the tradition of British social realism.

Real places, ordinary lives, small crews and, often, film. Our social impact work stands in a tradition British filmmakers built.

Social impact filmmaking Shot on Film

A note on this page

We work in the tradition of these filmmakers. We claim no connection to them, and nothing here implies their endorsement or involvement. Clips are BFI, Panavision and BAFTA films on their own channels, used for comment and credited.

The lineage

  1. A crew sets up camera, light and sound at a market under bunting on a location day.

    1956

    Free Cinema: short films about ordinary lives, shown at the National Film Theatre by Lindsay Anderson, Karel Reisz, Tony Richardson and Lorenza Mazzetti

  2. Crew in hi-vis prepare a camera on a busy street location.

    1960

    The British New Wave: Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, kitchen-sink drama on real streets

  3. An operator in a support rig frames a shot under bare trees on a street.

    1966

    Ken Loach's Cathy Come Home on the BBC

  4. A tracking vehicle follows a runner along a street.

    1969

    Kes: a Barnsley story with a largely non-professional cast, shot by Chris Menges

  5. A camera assistant and an actor beside a low slider on a street shoot.

    1997

    Shane Meadows's TwentyFourSeven

  6. An operator rides a tracking vehicle while crew crouch nearby on a street.

    2004

    Dead Man's Shoes, Shane Meadows

  7. A cinema camera on a street with shopfronts blurred behind.

    2008

    Steve McQueen's Hunger

  8. A small crew works a camera on a slider rig in the road on a location shoot.

    2009

    Andrea Arnold's Fish Tank, shot by Robbie Ryan

  9. A crew films on a pavement outside a coffee shop.

    2016

    I, Daniel Blake, written by Paul Laverty, wins Ken Loach's second Palme d'Or

  10. An operator lifts a camera rig while a crew member steadies it on a high street.

    2023

    The Old Oak, Ken Loach, shot by Robbie Ryan

Select a picture with a play button to watch the filmmaker talk about the work.

More of the lineage
  • Kitchen sink, or the British New Wave (about 1959 to 1963): Room at the Top, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, A Taste of Honey, The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner.
  • Ken Loach: Cathy Come Home (1966), Kes (1969), The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006) and I, Daniel Blake (2016), both Palme d'Or winners, and Sorry We Missed You (2019). Cinematographer Robbie Ryan BSC, ISC has shot his recent features.
  • Mike Leigh: a devised, rehearsal-based process; Secrets & Lies (1996, Palme d'Or).
  • Shane Meadows: A Room for Romeo Brass (1999), Dead Man's Shoes (2004), This Is England (2006) and its television sequels.
  • Andrea Arnold: Red Road (2006), Fish Tank (2009), American Honey (2016).
  • Lynne Ramsay: Ratcatcher (1999), Morvern Callar (2002).
  • Clio Barnard: The Arbor (2010), The Selfish Giant (2013).
  • Sir Steve McQueen: Hunger (2008) and Small Axe (2020).

A good short introduction to the Loach lineage: the Into Film feature on Ken Loach.

British life on film, from the BFI National Archive

What preserving the art form means

A crew member holds up a clapperboard in the rain beside market stalls on a location shoot.
  • Real places, not rebuilt on a stage.
  • Non-professional and local casts, alongside professionals.
  • Small crews, so the camera is close and the set is quiet.
  • Celluloid, often 16mm or 35mm, and handheld naturalism.
  • Class, work and place as the subject.

Each filmmaker works differently, so we describe methods, not anyone's rules. Keeping them alive means crews who can work lean, and location sound, handheld camera and film handling taught by people who do them.

An operator sits with a camera on a tracking vehicle at a unit base.A tracking vehicle films a cyclist on a residential street as a crew member looks on.A tracking vehicle and crew on a residential street.
A black, light-tight room with a single door open to a bright corridor.

CELLULOID

Film is still loaded by hand in a dark room. Somebody has to teach that.

Shot on Film

How Futures in Film works in that tradition

  • Small crews on real locations, making films with communities in the places they are about. Social impact filmmaking.
  • A craft route, with new entrants beside experienced crew on small-crew naturalism, location sound and handheld camera.
  • Film is still alive here. Shot on Film, our 35mm project, is built around a Panavision film camera, with Kodak and Digital Orchard.
  • Technology and tradition together. The same units test an LED wall and load a film magazine. Technology through time.

Keep watching

Where to watch the films

Next

Last reviewed 9 November 2026