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Restored by the BFI National Archive and The Film Foundation.
Hailed as Britain's first black feature film, Pressure is a groundbreaking depiction of second-generation experience in 1970s London.
Pressure follows Tony, the British-born son of Trinidadian parents, as he leaves school and encounters prejudice on individual and institutional levels. He struggles to find acceptance in the country he grew up in, yet has no Caribbean home he can dream of returning to. Unemployed and caught between an aspirational mother and a radical older brother, he drifts away from schoolfriends and towards Black power politics. Ové pulls no punches, his semi-documentary style and stark location shooting conveying the bleakness of West London in the mid-1970s. Funded by the BFI’s Production Board, Pressure retains its relevance today, portraying the challenges of preserving ones heritage while trying to assimilate in a Britain wrestling with transition to a multi-cultural society.
Cast:
Herbert Norville, Oscar James, Corinne Skinner-Carter