Dr Paul Moody will be a Visiting Researcher at the Bill Douglas Cinema Museum where he will be investigating the private papers of Don Boyd and Gavrik Losey, two British film producers who were active in the 1970s and 1980s. This visit will be part of Dr Moody's research for the book ‘EMI Films and the Limits of British Cinema’. The project will outline the first study of the entire output of a ‘transnational’ film company, as well as the first study of the ‘transnational’ applied to film production in the context of 1970s and 1980s Britain. It will ask ‘where does “national” cinema end and “transnational” cinema begin?’, or in other words, ‘what are the limits of British cinema?’.
Boyd was the producer of EMI’s ‘Honky Tonk Freeway’, an especially important film in EMI’s history as its box office failure marked the point at which EMI’s ambitions to regularly produce big budget ‘Hollywood’ movies came to an end. Losey’s papers provide an insight into some of EMI’s most commercially successful films, including the Richard Burton gangster thriller ‘Villain’ and the David Essex vehicles ‘That’ll be the Day’ and ‘Stardust’.
The Bill Douglas Museum at the University of Essex is a public museum and resource for those interested in researching moving image history.
Read Dr Moody's blog about his research over at The Bill Douglas Cinema Museum website.