Hazuan Hashim and Phil Maxwell’s captivating documentary about East London’s battle against racism is a well-crafted package of stock footage, interviews and incredible photographs.
There is enough material here for a series but FCSTBL substitutes chartered territory for a meticulous insight into the fascist uprising in the 1930s – when the mixed community joined forces to fight against Oswald Mosely’s Blackshirts – and the racism rife in that community since The Battle of Cable Street, most recently seeing the rise of the BNP in the 1980s.
FCSTBL maps the area’s transformation from poverty-stricken Whitechapel to the buzzing vibrancy of modern Shoreditch. Talking to residents and politicians while interspersing visuals of the Brick Lane of old to Banglatown and the modern graffiti-tagged art hub it is known as today, the film covers both the eclectic and radical sides of that area and the horrors it has harboured.
With an extra half hour and some greater unravelling FCSTBL could have been a masterpiece but it skims the surface of too many stories in its mere 74 minutes and as a result never totally gets under the skin of some of the characters. Despite its bleak poetry FCSTBL is far from harrowing, but is still a stunning documentary that is both absorbing and educational, just in need of a wider canvas.
Daniel has awarded From Cable Street to Brick Lane four Torches of Truth
