ABOUT THE FILM
This is the first feature documentary about Picture Post and its exceptional photographers.
We have had unique access to the Hulton Archives, which contain the complete Picture Post archives and thousands of negatives and contact sheets.
We have been able to film or source archive interviews with all the key Picture Post photographers, and with Picture Post editors and writers.
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DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT
Picture Post is arguably the most important magazine in British social history. It was born under the threat of War, and survived and flourished under the intense bombardment of the Blitz. Extraordinarily, during the height of World War II, Picture Post was looking ahead to post-War life and to the possibility of fundamental social reform.
Picture Post had a huge impact on national awareness of social conditions in Britain and of the need for a reformed welfare state and a national health service. It brought cutting-edge photography, and the picture story, to a mass audience. It changed people’s understanding of their own country by showing, vividly, what British life was really like.
I wanted to bring the extraordinary story of Picture Post and its photographers to modern audiences. Many of the things we take for granted in photography, and our understanding of photographs and picture layout, started with Picture Post. Many of our ideas about British society were forged by Picture Post and its unique group of creators.
