Cinema of Wales

Wales continued to produce film of varying quality throughout the 20th century, in both the Welsh and English languages, though indigenous production was curtailed through a lack of infrastructure and finance, which prevented the growth of the industry nationally.

[3] Henry Edwards who directed A Welsh Singer, also created the 1930 film Aylwin, from the novel by Theodore Watts-Dunton, drawing into the world of gypsies and a mythical, mystical Wales.

Designed as a tribute to the mining community of Lidice, Czechoslovakia, which had suffered from Nazi atrocities, The Silent Village transpose the events to a Wales; and was also used to draw analogies with the oppression of the Welsh language.

[5] The coming of the sound era had little impact on Welsh cinema, though 1938's The Citadel an adaptation of A. J. Cronin's 1937 novel brought Wales to a large audience; though King Vidor's interpretation failed to express the novel's political message.

John Ford's How Green Was My Valley is notable for starring just one Welsh actor, Rhys Williams, and for being shot in the United States.

Although John Ford's view of Wales was based on a mythical and romantic view of the industrialised valleys, Jill Craigie’s Blue Scar (1949), part financed by the National Coal Board, raised serious and radical questions about the nationalisation of the coal industry and has striking location photography around south Wales.

[3][5] Another release from 1949 to make an important cultural statement was Emlyn Williams' The Last Days of Dolwyn, the plot of which centred on the flooding of a Welsh village to create a reservoir; a subject that became extremely controversial in Wales in the 1960s.

[7] Ormond, a poet foremost, is remembered for his sensitive portrayals of writers and authors, and for documentaries concerned with the working class and with refugees, in particular Borrowed Pasture (1960) which follows two Polish ex-soldiers struggling to get by on a Carmarthenshire smallholding.

The fact that Wales was unable to produce films from within its own borders resulted in the stereotyping and common preconceptions of Welsh life formed by 'outside' film-makers.

[9] One of the few beacons of light for the industry came in the late 1970s with the output of left wing producer and director Karl Francis; whose controversial portrayal of contemporary life in the south Wales valleys was typified by his 1976 film Above us the Earth.

[9] S4C's 1995 policy, to produce up to two feature films a year, to be released to cinemas before television transmission allowed Welsh film-makers new opportunities.

Then in 1998, Kevin Allen produced Twin Town, a bawdy comedy satirising the older cultural traditions of Wales.

This though was surpassed at the box office by Justin Kerrigan's Human Traffic (1999), a stylised comedy focusing on the club and drug culture of Cardiff.

In 2009 a biopic of the early relationship between Welsh poet Dylan Thomas and his wife Caitlin Macnamara was released entitled The Edge of Love.

Siriol eventually branched into making feature length animations, including an adaptation of Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood (1992) and a joint venture with Hungarian company PannóniaFilm, The Princess and the Goblin (1992).

[18] Welsh-born directors who have gained international recognition include Richard Marquand, (Return of the Jedi), Peter Greenaway (Drowning by Numbers) and Terry Jones (Erik the Viking).

[20] Francis' work is embedded in a realistic exploration of Wales, its language and identity, in films such as Milwr Bychan (Boy Soldier) and The Mouse and the Women.

During the silent period Welsh actors of note included Jonah Benford, who came to prominence through cinema after starring in The Lodger (1927) and Downhill (1927); Gareth Hughes, often cast as a youthful charmer, gained excellent notices for the now-lost Sentimental Tommy (1921) and Lyn Harding, whose stature and presence made him a sought after villain playing Moriarty in several early Sherlock Holmes films.

A new wave of realism entered British acting, and at the forefront came Welsh actors Richard Burton, Stanley Baker and Rachel Roberts.

The 1990s also saw the success of Catherine Zeta-Jones, who became one of Hollywood's highest paid stars, appearing alongside Antonio Banderas and Anthony Hopkins in The Mask of Zorro and won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Chicago.