The full picture: perspectives on an archaeology of British screen advertising production

Screen advertising production is a relatively neglected domain of British screen history, largely overlooked in extant studies of the UK’s film production sector. The Guardian’s ‘Points of View’ (1986) is one of the more acclaimed works produced by that production sector which continues to attract popular interest. This article conducts an archaeological investigation into the industry through a case study analysis of ‘Points of View’ and an in-depth interview with its director, Paul Weiland. It explores the role of personal testimony in archaeological methods in media history. Whilst archival sources such as trade press can provide additional sources, they can never verify nor falsify the evidence of personal testimony, nor can they be used to fabricate a harmonious, consistent, or singular narrative of history. The analysis concludes that screen advertising was a hybrid cultural practice articulated during the 1970s to the 1990s as a solution to the problem: we’re not invited, please entertain. Remaining hidden from the establishment was favourable to agencies and production companies. It reminds us that means concealed or kept out of sight which invites the question ‘concealed from who’? Currently, we have one perspective on the history of screen advertising. We do not yet have the full picture.