White season
The programmes: part one
Last Orders
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Last Orders tells the story of the embattled Wibsey Working Men's Club in the city of Bradford.
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Once regarded as the "backbone of the nation", white working-class communities in the UK say they now often feel themselves the object of ridicule.
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Considering themselves forgotten by a Labour Government, which many people in these communities think is reluctant to acknowledge their existence, many white working class people feel as if they have fallen off the edge of the policy table, with the smoking ban the latest example.
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The Wibsey Club has been operating at a loss for several years and members' worries for their club mirror larger anxieties. With high unemployment and a perception that recent Asian immigrants receive the lion's share of Government benefits, members feel that their very community is under threat and that racial tensions could erupt at any time.
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BAFTA and Emmy-nominated director Henry Singer follows up his critically acclaimed 9/11 film, The Falling Man, by spending several months in one white working-class community whose story reveals much about the breakdown of social cohesion in 21st century Britain.
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Rivers Of Blood
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Rivers Of Blood is one of the best known speeches in British political history.
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For the first time on television Blakeway Productions has assembled the fragments of filmed speech that survive. In this hour-long documentary Enoch Powell's argument is examined in unprecedented detail.
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Powell prophesied that mass migration would lead to segregation and communal violence, but the incendiary nature of his language dominated the headlines. His core argument was largely ignored.
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This film examines Powell's character and the fears that drove him to make his fateful speech. We see how his words bitterly divided the nation.
Powell was cast out into the political wilderness. His speech became a byword for racism.
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Instead the nation embarked upon a radically different path; multiculturalism. But in the wake of riots and terror attacks many are asking: was Powell right to predict disaster?
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On the 40th anniversary of Rivers Of Blood this film explores the controversial claims and counter-claims surrounding one of Britain's most divisive politicians, and the most infamous speech in modern political history.
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White Girl
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Anna Maxwell Martin (Bleak House) stars in Abi Morgan's compelling film about an inspirational 11-year-old girl, Leah, and her family's relocation to an entirely Muslim community in Bradford. A provocative and emotional drama, it explores the hope as well as the tension that can arise when two very different cultures collide.
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Leaving her home in Leeds and a broken relationship with Stevie, Debbie begins a new life with her three children – but being the only white family in a wholly Asian community was never part of the plan.
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For Leah, the feeling of isolation is heightened at school when she discovers that she and her siblings are the only white kids. But Leah views the Muslim culture and faith with innocent fascination, finding a refuge of calm and safety which is in sharp contrast to the pain and sadness at home.
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Befriending Yasmin, her young Asian neighbour, and with the gentle guidance of teachers at school, Leah learns that her new world is not as alien as she first feared.
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However, nothing prepares Debbie for the shock of seeing her daughter wearing a hijab. With Leah's grandmother, Sonia, up in arms and Stevie back on the scene, the consequences are explosive – for Debbie and Leah alike.
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Starring Anna Maxwell Martin as Debbie, with newcomer Holly Kenny as Leah, Daniel Mays as Stevie and Melanie Hill as Leah's grandmother, White Girl is a tender exploration of Islam through the eyes of a child, from the writer of the BAFTA and RTS award-winning Sex Traffic.
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