John Grierson Movies

A portrait of John Grierson, the first Canadian Government Film Commissioner and founder of the National Film Board in 1939. Interweaving archival...

Farming techniques and modern methods bring new crops to market.

In this delightful fantasy adventure, a mild-mannered writer of adventure stories for girls finds himself presented with an intriguing proposition...

Marionette parody of Charlie Chaplin.

At Balloch Moss mine in Scotland, water comes through a seam bringing a torrent of mud into the mine and flooding the pit shaft, resulting in 118 men...

When Canada entered World War II, the National Film Board suddenly had an urgent new mission—and hundreds of women stepped forward, helping to...

Part of BFI collection "Police and Thieves."

A behind-the-scenes GPO Film Unit documentary (directed by Stuart Legg) that races from studio rehearsals and newsrooms to control rooms and...

Documentary about shipbuilding on the Clyde. In 1960, Glasgow and other towns and ports on the River Clyde, on the west coast of Scotland, were still...

The film, made to advertise domestic telephone sets, is based around two very different families. The Petts are conventional, happy and have...

An Irish "oracle" foretells the next day's track results to a newspaperman, resulting in a national uproar.

Trade Tattoo went even further than Rainbow Dance in its manipulation of the Gasparcolor process. The original black and white footage consisted of...

Short documentary showing the workings of a large London sorting office.

This documentary short examines the special train on which mail is sorted, dropped and collected on the run, and delivered in Scotland on the...

Made to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the London County Council, responsible for many of the changes celebrated in the film – modern...

The history of Scotland and the factors that have shaped the character of its people.

Legendary film director Alfred Hitchcock pays tribute to the "father of the documentary", John Grierson, exploring what made his work so...

In this parody of Sherlock Holmes, the Great Detective goes to an opium den of inequity in the dangerous London district of London and challenges...

A Cockney lad trains to be a messenger boy.