´óÏó´«Ã½

The story of film making in Wales is a long and distinguished one, reaching back to the 1890s when the cinema and the film makers art were in their infancy.

The very first film made in the country was a short silent feature on a royal visit to Cardiff, a modest enough beginning from which mighty oaks were to grow.

It was with the advent of pioneer film maker and fairground showman William Haggar that things moved on to an altogether higher level. Haggar made over 30 silent movies, many of them documentaries but some pieces of drama, such as the story of arch-criminal Charlie Peace (filmed, largely, at Pembroke Dock), and the defeat of the invading French army at Fishguard in 1797.

Haggar began a tradition that reached down the century to achieve fruition in the work of men like Karl Francis with his later Giro City and Ms Rhymney Valley.

Films in the Welsh language have also been produced over the years, starting with the 1935 release Y Chwarelwr. The most notable, however, has to be Hedd Wyn, the story of the Welsh poet killed in 1917, six weeks before he won the Chair at the National Eisteddfod. Hedd Wyn was nominated for an Oscar in 1992 and, that same year, won a Bafta for the best foreign language film - recognition indeed, even if the movie was denied the widespread distribution that it undoubtedly deserved.

There have been numerous films, by both British and American movie makers, made and set in Wales. The Citadel, released in 1938, is an early example where director King Vidor adapted and shot a Hollywood version of 's book about a doctor in the Welsh valleys.

A few years later John Ford came to film How Green Was My Valley. Viewed now, with hindsight and the benefit of both time and distance, the film seems hackneyed and clichéd - with miners singing hymns as they came home from their shifts at the end of the day - but in 1941 it won five Oscars including Best Picture and Best Director.

How Green Was My Valley was a sickly-sweet, idealised version of Wales, not dissimilar to Bette Davis' The Corn Is Green which was made at the end of World War Two. Tiger Bay, filmed in 1959 and starring John and Hayley Mills, gave an altogether grittier version of the country. Set in Cardiff's docklands but actually shot in Newport - Tiger Bay itself being considered far too rough and ready - the film caused many later visitors to the area to think that Cardiff also had a massive transporter bridge.

Since then there have been many films set in Wales, some of which have achieved immense popularity - the Richard Burton/Elizabeth Taylor version of Under Milk Wood, for example. The 1972 film may have been halting and unclear but it managed to give a new lease of life to Dylan Thomas' play.

More literary movies that have achieved recognition include experiments such as The Edge Of Love and The Englishman Who Went Up A Hill But Came Down A Mountain - the title being as intriguing as the film itself.

With its rugged mountains and sea cliffs Wales has often been the location for filming, even though the films have actually been set elsewhere. The Inn Of The Sixth Happiness, starring Ingrid Bergman and supposedly set in China was actually made in north Wales. The 1969 Carry On Up The Khyber, set on the north west frontier of India, was also filmed in north Wales, in and around the Llanberis Pass, while in 1968 Peter O'Toole, direct from his success as Lawrence of Arabia, arrived in Pembroke to film The Lion In Winter - the action supposedly taking place in France.

One of the most interesting films made in Wales was Moby Dick (1956), starring Gregory Peck. Filmed around the Fishguard area, the movie had a script by Ray Bradbury - his first - and featured a huge man-made white whale. With the filming over the whale broke its moorings and disappeared into the distance, never to be seen again.

There have been so many others - Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, An American Werewolf In London - even though it supposedly took place in the West Country - and the latest Harry Potter and Robin Hood films, to name just a few.

And, of course, Welsh characters feature quite heavily in many famous films. These range from Richard Burton's flat mate Cliff in Look Back in Anger to Burton's own drunken Welsh poet, MacPhisto, in Candy. No survey of Welsh involvement in the move industry, however brief, can ever ignore Stanley Baker's 1964 epic Zulu. The film, which also starred Ivor Emmanuel, told the story of the South Wales Borderers and their defence of Rorkes Drift during the Zulu War - not entirely accurately but certainly with gusto and lots of Welsh pride.

These days Wales has become something of a centre for television drama. Doctor Who and Torchwood regularly use Welsh location shots while Gavin and Stacey did more for the town of Barry than any regeneration programme.

One thing is clear, Wales has been, and will continue to be, heavily involved in the major media component of the last 100 or so years - the movie industry.

Read film critic and historian David Berry's guide to the Welsh film industry on the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Wales Arts website.