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...

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

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

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...

Ambitious documentary chronicling the cultural life and religious customs of the Sinhalese and the effects of advanced industrialism on such customs.

Norman McLaren was a cinematic genius who made films without cameras, and music without instruments. He produced sixty films in a stunning range of...

Filmed in Uganda, Man of Africa was assembled by legendary documentary producer John Grierson. The film depicts the mass migration of the Bakija and...

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

The life and work of the documentary pioneer.

A boy pursues his ambition to be a jockey

1935 documentary about the hard working life of Welsh coal miners.

Ada Shore (Diane Hart) arrives at Skerryvore University in Scotland in search of her long-lost uncle Connell O’Grady (Joseph Tomelty), who was...

A silent film by John Grierson. It tells the story of Britain's North Sea herring fishery.

Early documentary, slung together from footage depicting the first invasion of North America by Europeans, designed to show industrial technology's...

A stark warning about Britain’s coal-fired smog, charting its damage to health, buildings, and the economy while advocating cleaner...

Drama-documentary, reconstructing a real incident in which a trawler got into difficulties in a North Sea storm. Released 7th March 1938.

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

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...

Animated shapes dance to Cuban music. This was one of the first animations to be painted directly onto the film.

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