Rotherham up to Date

Visionary filmmaker Penny Woolcock explores half a century of British urban life using films digitised for Britain on Film, the archive project from BFI and its partner archives.

The tattered wallpaper of part demolished housing contrasts with gleaming new tower blocks. Ladywood in Birmingham may be on the up but what about the forgotten people?

Sheffield stands in as 'Smokedale', an industrial Everytown, in this stirring call for "new schools, new hospitals, new roads, new life", after WWII.

Coventry prepares to rise from the ashes of WWII in this docu-drama written by Dylan Thomas.

A bright and breezy promotional tour of Brum's original mega-mall.

Residents of Barnet and Stockton-on-Tees are the lucky beneficiaries of a government scheme to remedy Britain’s housing problem.

Edwardian workers react to the camera at one of Rotherham's major employers.

Naturalist Michael Clegg retraces the paths of merchants who travelled from Cheshire to Rotherham with their goods.

A genuinely fascinating businessman, with workman’s hands, an old battered Austin, still labouring at 77, and keeping many a church going.

This is an absorbing film of a Remembrance Day service and procession in Rotherham, unusual in being held in wartime, and made more poignant for being so.

Quieter than a diesel bus, more manoeuvrable than a tram. The Guy trolley bus is the answer to all your transport problems and they're 'perfectly safe up to 40mph'.

An intriguing and enigmatic early short film of photographers taking themselves as subjects having discovered the joys of moving image.

Daniel Kokotajlo talks to Nia Childs about Starve Acre, his folk horror about a couple digging deep into grief in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales.

Sky Peals director Moin Hussain and lead actor Faraz Ayub talk to Tomisin Adepeju about their magic realist drama.

Documentary exploring the BFI National Archive’s role in rediscovering and remastering the early films of Michael Powell.

Bryony Dixon, curator of silent film at the BFI national archive, explores the origins of a series of comic travelogues, and Michael Powell's involvement in making them.

Discover why Dan George of Northumbria University believes everyone should experience Oldboy at least once.

Trixie Parkin-Christie of Northumbria University offers fresh insight into why Wings of Desire remains essential viewing.