Join London Socialist Film Co-op for an all-day event commemorating the 40th anniversary of the events at Orgreave on 18 June 1984. We will present two screenings, morning and afternoon, exploring the history, legacy and contemporary significance of state violence and media manipulation during the 1984/5 Miners Strike.

The morning screening will present three documentaries from 1985, produced in solidarity with the miners’ campaign. Straight Speaking: Miners Campaign Tape 4 was produced in 1985 to counter media-manipulation during the strike and introduces the lies and broken promises made by the National Coal Board. Following this, two films by pioneering filmmaker Yvette Vanson, The Battle For Orgreave and Taking Liberties, directly explore the police intimidation and violence at Orgreave and in mining communities across the UK.

The screening will be followed by a panel and Q&A with Kate Flannery, Secretary of the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign, Arlen Harris, award-winning filmmaker, broadcaster and researcher in the histories of colonial and state violence, and Yvette Vanson of  Platform Films and the British Film Institute.

Programme for the Morning Screening:

Straight Speaking: Miners Campaign Tape 4 (1985), Platform Films

The Battle For Orgreave (1985), Yvette Vanson, Channel 4

Open Space: Taking Liberties (1985), Yvette Vanson, BBC

With thanks to Yvette Vanson, Platform Films and the British Film Institute