Occasionally, vital pieces of the cultural jigsaw disappear without anyone really noticing. This, sadly, was the fate of Contemporary Films, the British film distributor that popularised sophisticated, grownup international cinema – foreign language mostly – in the UK, and heralded the arrival of the auteur generation with directors such as Ingmar Bergman, Satyajit Ray, Andrzej Wajda and Yasujiro Ozu. Contemporary, and its founder Charles Cooper, weren’t the only game in town – Kenneth Rive’s Gala was a fellow traveller – but Contemporary got there first, setting up shop in 1951, first with short films for the then popular film society sector, and moving into features with the 1952 Japanese film Children of Hiroshima.
Its marketplace clout faded rapidly in the early 1990s, when it was a victim of changing industry practices. But amazingly, the company is still with us – and is planning a 75th anniversary series of screenings to showcase its history. Such is Contemporary’s lustre that, along with screenings of films such as Miloš Forman’s A Blonde in Love, Bergman’s Wild Strawberries and Jack Hazan’s David Hockney documentary A Bigger Splash, the great and good are turning out in support, led by Mike Leigh, whose feature film directing debut, Bleak Moments, was picked up by Contemporary in 1971.
It was financed by Albert Finney, still riding high on his 1960s acting successes. As a homegrown, off-kilter feature, it was a slightly unusual item for Contemporary to pick up. But actually, when you think about it, they were pretty remarkable and they embraced this thing.” Now a Palme d’Or and Golden Lion winner, Leigh undoubtedly understands the impact the company had on his own development.
But it is its effect on the wider culture, the openness and cosmopolitanism that Contemporary helped to foster, that is arguably its most important contribution. I saw only Hollywood and British movies. So when I came to London, world cinema suddenly presented itself.
I have recollections of seeing Russian films, Italian neorealism, you name it. It was all going on, and Contemporary was very much at the centre of that.” Cooper, the driving force behind it all, was an East End Jew – the son of a butcher from Ukraine – and a committed communist who saw cinema as a way to build awareness. Before the second world war, he brought Soviet films to the UK via Kino, the film section of the Workers’ Theatre Movement, then spent the war in New York running a film section for the International Workers Order.
Deported from the US in 1950, Cooper set about supplying films to hungry fans in film societies, of which there were an estimated 200 across Britain. The increasing interest in foreign “art” films meant Cooper was in tune with the intellectual times, with his special interest in eastern European and underclass-oriented films. Part of Cooper’s strength, it seems, was his devotion to family life and willingness to involve his children in his day-to-day.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
