Ashlee Family Films: Christine Opening Christmas Presents, Bexley (1958)

Comic short by amateur London film-maker featuring a young witch and her attempts to pass an examination in spellcraft.

Dark comic short riffing on Cold War paranoia and pre-empting social media arguments filmed by Bexley amateur.

Two schoolchildren give the family car a very thorough wash after first feeding the rabbits.

Lovely scenes of a school summer sports day in 1964, beginning with fancy dress and including numerous obstacle races.

Well-made short film showing an evening at a local gun club in suburban Bexley in the 1960s.

Some majestic shots of steamers on the Thames estuary at Erith feature in this short film, which also includes adverts for dog food and bird feeding.

The director of a documentary about British funk pioneers Cymande joins the band at BFI Southbank to talk about the film.

Plotting world domination, Devil Doctor Fu-Manchu steals plans for a new aero-torpedo in this earliest surviving thrill-a-minute serial instalment.

Filmmakers Jane Giles and Ali Catterall discuss their documentary Scala!!!, revisiting the legendary and inspirational cinema venue and some of the most notorious films that screened there.

Long thought lost, this Powell-directed promotional short for a veteran’s charity was only rediscovered in 2003.

A poignant, stirring letter from a recently deceased pilot to his mother is read by John Gielgud.

Former Bristol Poet Laureate, Miles Chambers reads a poem specially commissioned for the 75th anniversary of the NHS.