Genre:
Documentary
Distributor:
BFI
Rating: 12
DVD Release Date:
17th March 2014 (UK)
Director:
Martin Wallace, Jarvis Cocker
Buy:The Big Melt (DVD)
First things first, let’s get all the necessaries out of the way…
The Big Melt was specially commissioned by the Sheffield Doc/Fest; it was made to mark the centenary of stainless steel production; it uses steel-related archival footage drawn from the BFI National Archive; and Jarvis Cocker provided the musical accompaniment.
Now that is out of the way, let’s get on with the review…
If the back cover of the BFI DVD is to be believed the film is an ‘elegy’ to those men and women who toiled in the steelworks of Sheffield and is a ‘hymn’ to our proud industrial past. In this context, the word ‘elegy’ gives the impression that we should lament and feel melancholic toward these men and women, while the word ‘hymn’ suggests that we should be in praise of Britain’s industrial past. However, upon watching the film, and in contrast to that description, the sentence should have read: The Big Melt is an ‘elegy’ to our industrial past and a ‘hymn’ to the men and women who toiled in the steelworks of Sheffield. For in the hands of Martin Wallace and Jarvis Cocker it is the industry for which we should be in grieving and the people that are deserving of our praise.
People are central to The Big Melt and Cocker’s biggest concern was that “I only hope that we can pay proper homage to the extraordinary individuals featured in this footage.” He need not be concerned though as it is the people that make the film so appealing. Among the many memorable images of people that Wallace and Cocker assembled for the film, two images stand out above all the rest. The first that deserves mention is of a young woman in work overalls who lowers her protective dust mask to give the most captivating of smiles directly into the camera. What is great about this image and the sequence that follows – in which we watch her hammering away at shells in a munitions factory – is not only the connection Cocker was intrigued by when he pointed out that she has the look of someone you might meet today and is not just a face from the past, but the way her image connotes thoughts and feelings concerning the role of women in society both now and then.
The other stand out image the film provides is of a young lad sticking two fingers up at the camera in the same defiant way Billy Casper did in Ken Loach’s Kes. Taken from 1901 footage showing workers queuing up outside a Rotherham steelworks, the image represents defiance and, as Cocker aptly adds, “an absolute refusal to conform to society’s expectations.” And for Cocker it was this attitude of defiance and non-conformity that drew him to the project in the first place and not the steel industry with which he has never identified. So when we hear him sing “Just what are we living for?” it is not mournful but celebratory. It is celebratory of that attitude, of that worldview.
It would be fair to say there is a lot going on in The Big Melt but the most pertinent aspect brings this review full circle and makes it clear why I believe the film is an ‘elegy’ for and not a ‘hymn’ to our industrial past. For the images and lyrics of defiance do not only undermine the idea that the film is a celebration of our industrial past, they also remind us that these industries are no longer there at all. So when the choir rather poignantly lulls us with the line “When you’re a man you shall follow your daddy,” the lyrics take on a greater significance because of the dichotomy between on the one hand growing up with the only prospect being to work in the local industry and on the other hand growing up with no work prospects at all.
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