While BBC Four has technically survived the latest round of cost cutting, it's nevertheless suffered what will surely prove to be a fatal blow: being deprived of the ability to commission new content and thereby destined to become an archive-only channel. As Jeanie Finlay has argued in an article for the BFI's Sight & Sound, the consequences of the decision are deeply concerning: "It makes me wonder, where is the place for quiet films from new, unknown, diverse voices to flourish? Where might smaller, more intimate films get the chance for that broadcast moment?"
Finlay writes as someone who has reaped the benefits - getting commissioned to make an hour-long documentary for the channel in 2003 proved to be her big break. And she's right to worry. Recent music films King Rocker and Poly Styrene: I Am A Cliche, for instance, were aired on Sky Arts, but the former was the project of a nationally renowned cult comedian, Stewart Lee, and the latter was the latest documentary from Paul Sng, who already has several others under his belt. It's hard to imagine that channel - or many others - taking a punt on a film like Finlay's wonderful Sound It Out, about the last remaining record shop in her native Stockton-on-Tees.
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