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Beckett Park Primary School:
Photographs and description of the video


The edited video (11 minutes 9 seconds):

The opening titles are accompanied by shots of a local street, the children in Beckett Park, and the school itself.

We cut to a black-and-white 'widescreen' format - the style of the interview sections in this video - where Izoduwa is seated with a guest: 'Good morning, and in the show with me I've got Claire ---, on about the environment. If you want to call in and ask Claire questions, you know the number by now. [To Claire:] Where you live, is it tidy or is it messy?'. 'Pretty messy'. 'And being an environmental person, wouldn't you not think like it should be tidy?'. 'Yes'. 'So why don't you do something about it-?'.

We cut to Chris in sunglasses, standing outside, by a sign: 'Round here, it's really, like, tree-ey, and it's like a sign behind me, and it says "no tipping", so it probably used to be like, really like messy round here, so that's why they've put that sign up, but it's still messy even though they've got that sign up'. Laura then shows us a similarly unkempt area.

We return to Izoduwa interviewing Claire: 'What do you think of your environment, the world environment?'. 'Some parts it's messy, some parts it's clean'. 'But what do you think of it? Do you think it should be tidy, do you think it should - what do you think about it exactly?'. 'More people should stop dropping litter'. 'And that's including yourself?'. 'Yeah'. 'Very well...'.

Alan shows us another green but messy area near the school: 'There's litter all around the place, so it's not a nice area to play, for kids. Well, it could be if it got cleaned up, 'cause there's loads of trees and stuff, but it's just not nice, 'cause of all the litter'.

Music, and we go to the local shops, where we find Izoduwa. 'If you want to help our environment, then what you have to do is put your litter, after you've finished it, in the bin. Now you see round here is messy, all because of you. Now just because I live round here doesn't mean I drop the litter. I don't drop nothing. I always put it in these litter bins, so why don't you do the same?'. She then demonstrates by finishing her drink and dropping the can in the bin. 'See, that's all that you have to do. So this is an advertisement of all you have to do is put your rubbish in the bin, and you can help our environment. Thank you'.

We cut to Laura, being interviewed: 'The school, round here... we can pick up the litter. And people who live round here should do, like, a meeting or something, and pick it all up, like Greenpeace'.

Claire says, 'This is Beckett Park,' and to music we see the children playing on the slide and swings, which they energetically jump from. Laura shows us graffiti on the equipment, but says, 'It is a very nice place to come and play, and the grass is always cut round here'. Izoduwa shows us the park in more detail, and notes, 'There's trees all around it, so it's a nice site. There's not that much litter because there's a nice, stoney bin around the corner, and there's benches for you if you just want to sit down and read. So really, this is a beautiful park, for peace'. Alan then slides into shot, and adds further largely appreciative comments.

Laura shows us the 'beautiful' woods and flowers in the park, which the other children are playing in. 'It's really nice round here'.

In interview, Laura says that the town centre is particularly messy with litter: 'There's a lot of people that go round there and just drop it, and they couldn't care less'.

Martyn shows us people relaxing in the sunny park. We then see Izoduwa in a different part of the park: 'Okay, this is the environment that I'm in, and you're in, cameragirl, and I'd just like to say, all these things on the floor are a part of nature. [...] It's just peaceful, and it's a nice place for all of us to be'.

Chris tells us about the Beckett Park campus of the Metropolitan University. He decides, 'They've done a good job to make it look like this'. Izoduwa adds: 'One thing what's nice about this place, is that it's got a lovely nice park so you can come and study, like that lady over there. It's tidy, it's clean, and it's just a nice view to look at. There's no litter, it's, erm, got nice trees, and it's just a perfect place to come to'.

We cut to Alan, being interviewed, who says, quite thoughtfully and quietly, 'If nobody cared about the environment then it'd be, there'd be loads of litter, and everything about would stink, and stuff like that, and there'd be black clouds in the sky every day, there'd be acid rain and everything, so, there has to be somebody who cares about the environment'.

To music, we see other shots from the production, going into the end titles, including a shot of each child as they are named.

The text and images on this site are by David Gauntlett, © 1997, 2004.
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