With Gangsters the BBC can rightly claim to have created one of the pioneering works of TV history, a dazzling, gaudy melting pot of a drama rarely matched in its creative ambitions.
Gangsters brings together an urban crime story story with Asian detectives and Chinese gangsters, all articulated through the stylings of kung fu, Bollywood, spaghetti western and blaxploitation films (some would call it post-modern) set in Birmingham, that most diverse of UK cities, in the mid 1970s. It shouldn’t really work but somehow does, unforgettably.
TV production from this era is often dismissed for its political incorrectness – think Love Thy Neighbour or Mind Your Language. This now dominant view often obscures some of the more audacious drama of the time which, like Gangsters, can still excite and feel relevant 40 years later.
This screening will be introduced by Marcus Prince from the BFI’s TV Unit.
