Made by Liver Cine Group member Jim Gonzales in the early 1960s, this amateur
film shot in and around Liverpool city centre stands out in particular for its
detailed depiction of the spaces and buildings around Queen Square and St
George's Place, an area of the city that has witnessed profound urban
transformation since the 1960s.
Gonzales' film starts off by exploring the landscape around Pier Head,
including the iconic Liver Building and St Nicholas' Church. Repeated and
pronounced use of the zoom is evident in these sequences, suggesting the
filmmaker may perhaps have been experimenting with new camera technology.
Footage shot in Exchange Flags behind the Town Hall and of Tempest Hey off Dale
Street indicate that Gonzales is heading uphill from Pier Head towards the city
centre, as if having just arrived by ferry.
The main part of the film is centred exclusively in and around the old market
area around Great Charlotte Street, Queen Square, Williamson Square and St
George's Place. Gonzales carefully observes the facades of the buildings,
recording street names, shop signs, hotels, businesses and other commercial
establishments long since vanished. Charting the film's locations on a 1950s
ordnance survey map of the area reveals a filmic geography that is clearly
focused on the spaces and buildings around the whole of the market area, spaces
which are now dominated by the much-loathed St John's Precinct shopping centre
and Queen Square multi-story car park.
The slow, lingering camerawork, scanning the buildings and panning across
streets and squares, signals a desire to capture and memorialise a disappearing
landscape, one that by the early 1960s had already been earmarked for demolition
as part of plans to extensively redevelop this area of Liverpool. In the film
the streets are mostly empty of people and traffic, lending the space a further
air of impending and ghostly absence. The film is also notable for featuring
rare footage showing the shops, restaurants and hotels that stretched along St
George's Place, a view which used to greet visitors to Liverpool arriving by
train.
Les Roberts
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