Film and the British Atomic Project

Abstract

This essay explores the process through which the moving image became part of the promotion of Britain as a new nuclear nation in the mid-1950s. Made by, for, or with the authority of the newly created United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority, a number of films were produced by different companies, all presenting the UKAEA as a modern, national asset, justifying its development of both military and civil uses of atomic energy together. There was no sophisticated studio for this purpose to match Lookout Mountain and the role it played in the US military development of atomic weapons. Instead the Central Office of Information Films Division and the documentary production companies it employed used the skills and resources still in existence after the heyday of the British documentary movement to document and represent a new important reality.