This paper discusses film director John Schlesinger who, in the 1960s, was part of a new social realism in British films and a revivification of the British film industry.
This paper explains that the social realism of the early 1960s was an accidental movement in film in which numerous films were produced for and about the working class, depicting working class life in realistic and dramatic terms, rather than comic terms. The paper points out that Schlesinger depicts characters facing a crisis in their lives when forced to confront the reality of their existence in films like “Midnight Cowboy”, for which he won an Oscar, and “The Falcon and the Snowman”. The paper relates that Schlesinger is known for films with a careful mixture of social commentary and entertainment value, as he makes his social observations entertaining to audiences.
“In the 1960s, film director John Schlesinger was part of a new social realism in British films and a revivification of the British film industry. Schlesinger came out of television and broke through to the world cinema with films like A Kind of Loving (1962), Billy Liar (1963), and Darling (1965), after which he began making most of his films in the United States beginning with the major success of Midnight Cowboy (1969). In his early work, Schlesinger made 26 films for the BBC, worked as second unit director on several television series, and eventually managed to make his first feature with A Kind of Loving.”