Rail workers battle winter’s worst in this kinetic, Oscar®-nominated classic
Nominated for an Academy Award in 1965, the late British director Geoffrey Jones’s Snow uses a kinetic visual style and percussive, locomotive-inspired music to reimagine how British Railways workers coped with the ‘Big Freeze’ of 1962-63, one of the UK’s coldest winters on record. Expertly edited to highlight the contrast between the comforts of train passengers and the tireless labour of the workmen, Jones’s film illustrates the tremendous efforts necessary to keep civilisation moving in the face of nature’s enormous indifference.
Director: Geoffrey Jones
Producer: Edgar Anstey
videoTravel
Retracing Mark Twain’s path, a filmmaker sets out to understand the mighty Mississippi
28 minutes
videoWork
Like a cheery Sisyphus, Fred dismantles an industrial chimney one brick at a time
12 minutes
videoGlobal history
After the fall of the Iron Curtain, a young couple discovers a strange, newly open world
18 minutes
videoArt
A young Rockefeller collects art on a fateful journey to New Guinea
7 minutes
videoDemography and migration
In California’s farmlands, immigrant workers share their stories of toil and hope
17 minutes
videoHome
Life moves slowly in a Romanian mountain village, shaped by care and the seasons
13 minutes
videoNature and landscape
‘A culture is no better than its woods’ – what our trees reveal about us, by W H Auden
5 minutes
videoGender
A catchy tune explains the world’s ‘isms’ – according to your mum doing the laundry
5 minutes
videoTechnology and the self
The commodified childhood – scenes from two sisters’ lives in the creator economy
14 minutes