Metadata
WORK ID: YFA 5290 (Master Record)
| Title | Year | Date |
| BONFIRE NIGHT | 1957 | 1957-11-05 |
|
Details
Original Format: 16mm Colour: Black & White Sound: Silent Duration: 3 mins 40 secs Credits: Alan Sidi Subject: Family Life |
| Summary This is a film of the Sidi family and friends at a traditional home bonfire night in Leeds with a fireworks display. |
|
Description
This is a film of the Sidi family and friends at a traditional home bonfire night in Leeds with a fireworks display.
The film begins with a group of adults and children standing outside in the dark, watching a bonfire and a fireworks display made up of rockets and various other fireworks. Several children stand quite close to a firework, and they bend down to light their sparklers from the bonfire. Several small fireworks are put together on a box and, not very successfully, lit...
This is a film of the Sidi family and friends at a traditional home bonfire night in Leeds with a fireworks display.
The film begins with a group of adults and children standing outside in the dark, watching a bonfire and a fireworks display made up of rockets and various other fireworks. Several children stand quite close to a firework, and they bend down to light their sparklers from the bonfire. Several small fireworks are put together on a box and, not very successfully, lit simultaneously. The film focuses on one small girl holding a sparkler. There are more images of the bonfire before the film comes to an end.
Context
A time when Guy Fawkes Night was a family affair with a bonfire in the back garden, complete with baked potatoes and small firework displays to delight the children.
Bonfire Night was a big event in the year for kids in the 1950s and ‘60s, going out with their stuffed guys beseeching all and sundry for money, especially outside pubs. On the night itself, as seen here in Leeds, there was a great atmosphere as the darkening nights were lit up by Roman Candles bought with the hard earned...
A time when Guy Fawkes Night was a family affair with a bonfire in the back garden, complete with baked potatoes and small firework displays to delight the children.
Bonfire Night was a big event in the year for kids in the 1950s and ‘60s, going out with their stuffed guys beseeching all and sundry for money, especially outside pubs. On the night itself, as seen here in Leeds, there was a great atmosphere as the darkening nights were lit up by Roman Candles bought with the hard earned money. And family and friends gather around to keep warm by the makeshift bonfire made from old pieces of timber, possibly gathered from nearby derelict houses. This is a film made by the ever enterprising Alan Sidi of Leeds. Alan was a very prolific, inventive and skilled filmmaker who made lots of wonderful films, including many with the Leeds Movie Makers. Although bonfire night originates with the 1605 Catholic plot to blow up Parliament, by Victorian times it became more associated with working class youth and rowdyism. This association remained until the time of this film, when the original historical connection had largely been lost. Its popularity after the war was matched by the large number of fireworks brands – Astra, Benwell, Brock’s, Lion, Pain’s, Rainbow, Wells, Wessex and Wilder’s, to name a few – of which possibly only Standard remains today. This film is available to be licensed for non-commercial creative reuse. For more information please contact yfa@yorksj.ac.uk |
