Franc Roddam

  • Franc Roddam & Paul Watson – The Family (1974)

    Franc Roddam1971-1980DocumentaryPaul WatsonTVUnited Kingdom

    The Family, Paul Watson, 1974

    12 x 30’ – First “fly on the wall” documentary serial.
    Press Critics Prize – National Archive.

    A ‘fly on the wall’ look at the working-class Wilkins family from Reading.

    Modelled on the 13-part observational series, An American Family (US, d. Craig Gilbert, 1972), producer Paul Watson’s 12-part The Family (BBC, 1974) is credited with creating the concept of the ‘fly-on-the-wall’ documentary in Britain. Regardless, Watson’s cinema verité-style, warts-and-all portrait of the working-class Wilkins family certainly popularised an ‘observational’ style still seen as the defining characteristic of British documentary some twenty-five years later.Read More »

  • Franc Roddam – Quadrophenia (1979)

    1971-1980DramaFranc RoddamMusicalUnited Kingdom

    Quote:
    London, 1965: Like many other youths, Jimmy hates the philistine life, especially his parents and his job in a company’s mailing division. Only when he’s together with his friends, a ‘Mod’ clique, cruises London on his motor-scooter and hears music such as that of ‘The Who’ and ‘The High Numbers’, he feels free and accepted. However, it’s a flight into an illusionary world.Read More »

Back to top button