Moving with the times: surviving film collective cultures in British and German contexts

This article examines recent developments in documentary film-making in British and German film collective cultures owing to evolving sociopolitical and socioeconomic circumstances since the countercultural era. Research on film collectives has tended to concentrate on their sociopolitical function as a platform for agitation, enquiry, exposition and expression of alternative perspectives. This function, it is argued, renders film collective cultures distinctive in facilitating democratic practice. However, the aforementioned circumstances have gradually fostered other ascendant imperatives alongside the sociopolitical function, the interplay of which causes huge problems for film collective producers as do demands from subsidy and broadcasters. Drawing on relevant scholarship and ethnography, this article explores producers’ responses to (1) the competing imperatives, (2) to pressures from subsidy and broadcasters and (3) to perceptions of work following these. My main argument is three-fold: first, producers have devised mechanisms to circumvent pressures some of which though pragmatic, threaten to undermine the sociopolitical significance of film collective cultures in democratic communication. Second, I emphasise the need to revise the theoretical propositions guiding this field to reflect current developments. Third, I suggest further research on the impact of increasing professionalisation and commercialisation, on appropriate strategies for self-sustenance and on effective ways of preserving the history of film collectives as part of a shared heritage.