Amateur film-making in Bradford was once a glamorous pastime. At the height of the Bradford Movie Makers’ powers there was a seven-year waiting list for membership, hundreds attended the organisation’s annual film festival and every year bus loads of immaculately dressed members would descend on the seaside town of Bridlington for their summer trip.
Fast forward to 2019 and former club president Colin Egglestone, now 89, was outside in the middle of winter in pitch darkness determinedly painting over the graffiti on the doors of the clubhouse. It would barely last the evening before a fresh set of scribbles appeared. Bradford Movie Makers – set up in 1932 as Bradford Cine Circle – was in trouble. It had an ageing membership that barely reached double figures, with no new blood coming in. The organisation was five years behind on the rent, its premises a constant target for vandalism, break-ins and fly-tipping, and its backyard a convenient dumping ground for anything from fridges to condoms to used needles. The end looked imminent.
