RISING 2014
Karl Francis Miss Rhymney Valley 1985
Over the last 30 years, Karl Francis has become the leading Welsh film and television director and producer with films that are keenly awaited in his home country and shown to great acclaim at festivals around the world. Yet Karl has always remained rooted firmly outside of the establishment, even, arguably during his stint as Head of Drama at BBC Wales in the '90s.
He has maintained a determined independence and his films often savagely criticise the institutions which run Welsh political and cultural life. In contemporary cinema, Karl has always been defiantly unfashionable, a film maker whose prime concern is, and always has been, content over style. That is not to imply that his films lack finesse and visual imagination, indeed they often display a very real cinematic sense - but in a period more dedicated to fantasy than fact, Karl Francis is a determined realist.
Francis has always been a shamelessly partisan film maker. He has no time for the notions of balance which politicians demand of television. His idea of film-making is to represent the feelings and grievances of the people in the film, rather than impose on them from the outside.
In much of his early work Francis documented and analysed the political and social issues of contemporary South Wales - the traumas of pit closures, the disintegration of communities and the mass unemployment which followed in their wake. Many of these films are located and shot in areas close to his own birthplace, and feature many local people in key roles. This intimacy and special knowledge contribute much to the power and sense of purpose of this work.
Francis has also demonstrated a considerable versatility and has successful diversified into some more mainstream projects. However in these films and television series have always held the Francis stamp of political didacticism. All his best work has been centred on ordinary people and their struggle against difficult circumstances caused by the poverty of their environment, or the decisions made by those in positions of power.
Made for the BBC (Screen 2), Miss Rhymney Valley 1985 is set during the miners strike and caused huge controversy. Seen entirely from the point of view of the miners, real people act out the drama of their lives, set against the real background of picket lines