Salt of the Earth (Research Footage)

Precious footage of 1950s Israel, shot by Michael Powell while scouting locations for an unrealised project.

In 1953, Michael Powell travelled round Israel, camera in hand, scouting locations for an unrealised project. With him were producer Emeric Pressburger and one of their key creative collaborators, set designer Hein Heckroth; all three can be glimpsed in the footage. They were planning a film based on the memoirs of Chaim Weizmann, the country’s first President. Shot on 16mm film, these home movies capture the people and places, landscapes and wildlife, and habits and traditions during the early years of the nascent nation, as seen through the eyes of one of Britain’s foremost cinematic visionaries.