The Miners' Film

Cinema Action describe themselves as a non-profit-making collective of trade unionists dedicated to working class films. The Miners' Film, made around the 1974 strike, although necessarily partisan, avoids the distortions of so many seemingly 'honest' documentaries through its refusal to impose an overall viewpoint via a commentary. The miners are allowed to articulate for themselves the hardships of their recurring struggle and their strengthening solidarity. As a Welsh miner puts it: 'We're gradually understanding now that the greatest power, the most important people, are the people that produce. And I believe that 1974 was the turning point, when this power was realised for the first time.'