The Big Smoke

'The Big Smoke' explores the forgotten face of the capital with a tantalising tour through half a century of life in London.

A newly-commissioned score has been laid over silent films from the BFI National Archive, featuring a selection of films provided by London’s Screen Archives – the regional network supporting organisations in London that hold collections of moving image material.

Londoners of all ages would flock to see themselves immortalised in moving pictures and now a new generation has the chance to undertake this journey.

Highlights of the programme include:

• Blackfriars Bridge (1896), an extraordinary glimpse of Victorians travelling to work by horse-drawn tram and on foot at an enviably elegant pace

• Sci-fi short The Fugitive Futurist (1924) sees an oddball inventor startle Londoners with a glimpse of their great city’s future

• Scenes at Piccadilly Circus and Hyde Park Corner Underground Stations (1931) offers an ethereal insight into the change and continuity of tube life