Andrew Marr's History of Modern Britain

Episodes 1-4 have been taken down, but episode 5 has appeared...strangely enough. If you had not watched episode 5, please do so before it gets taken down! I will try to find more copies of the whole series soon.

Andrew Marr's History of Modern Britain is a 5 part 2007 BBC documentary television series presented by Andrew Marr that covers the period of British history from the end of the Second World War onwards.




1. Advance Britannia, 1945 - 1955
Britain in 1945; the country is victorious but nearly bankrupt. As Clement Attlee's Labour government sets out to build 'New Jerusalem', Britain is forced to hold out the begging bowl in Washington. Though Ealing Studios produces a series of very British comedies and there is a spirit of hope in the air, the British people's growing impatience with austerity threatens to take the country from bankruptcy to self-destruction.

2. The Land of Lost Content, 1955 - 1964
The 1950s were a period of apparent calm, order and prosperity for Britain, but much of the populace was hungry for change, many began to distrust the government and protestors and satirists led people to question and mock their rulers. In 1961, the liaison between working-class Christine Keeler and Secretary of State for War John Profumo brought the closed world of the British establishment together with the cocky new Britain growing up around it.

3. Paradise Lost, 1964 - 1979
As the 1960s progress, Harold Wilson takes centre stage in a rapidly changing Britain as the country looks to modern technology and a fairer, liberated future. However, the Wilson governments presided over years of industrial conflict, stagnation and decline. As Edward Heath's government ascends to power in the 1970s, British industry is reduced to working a three-day week, electricity is rationed and the country is again haunted by the shadow of wartime austerity.

4. Revolution! 1979 - 1990
The Britain of Margaret Thatcher and comes to some surprising conclusions about the British national character. It was a period of extreme ideological polarisation. Imperial visions stirred again as the fleet sailed for the Falklands. Privatisation and deregulation amounted to a cultural, economic and political revolution. Heroic national rescue operation or final act of self-destruction? An exploration of the extent to which we British are all now the children of Thatcher.

5. New Britannia, 1990 - 2007
Britain enters the uncharted waters of the post-Thatcher era. Many have done well in the end during the Thatcher years but now boom is turning to bust. Britain feels more vulnerable than ever to rapid international change - from the influence of powerful new global market forces to global warming. Just when many in post-war Britain are getting used to the good life, it seems we might have to start giving up our big cars and foreign holidays.

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