National Screen and Sound Archive of Wales preserves and celebrates the sound and moving image heritage of Wales, making it accessible to a wide range of users for enjoyment and learning. Its film collection reflects every aspect of the nation’s social, cultural and working life across the 20th century, giving a fascinating insight into Welsh filmmaking, both amateur and professional.
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A Letter from Wales (Welsh-language version)
A hard task it is for a schoolboy to sit and write a letter when so much more exciting things are claiming his attention. His adventures are dramatised as he relates them on paper.
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Overview
Rhys Ifan’s life in Llandwrog is full of incident and gradually, at his mother’s insistence, he gets it all down on paper in a letter to his cousin in Australia. Scripted by John Gwilym Jones who was born and bred in the Llandwrog area, with music composed by harpist Osian Ellis, the film features Sam Jones (Head of the BBC in Bangor) as a kindly schoolmaster. Mrs Katie Wyn Jones of Cefn Hengwrt Farm and her four children – plus a friend from Bodafon - were chosen to play the family.
Produced by Brunner Lloyd & Co Ltd for the Children’s Film Foundation and intended for screenings on Saturday mornings, this film was made with both a Welsh and an English soundtrack. It features the Porthdinllaen lifeboat and is a happy blend of children, animals and indulgent grown-ups, filmed around Llandwrog, the home turf of the scriptwriter who was a lecturer in Welsh Literature at the university in Bangor. He also scripted an earlier film – ‘Noson Lawen/The Fruitful Year’ (1950) – which was based on a radio series created by Sam Jones. *To enable English subtitles for this film, once the video is playing select CC in the video playback bar (at the bottom of the screen) and select Closed Captions = On.*
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