The last old style boozer on the London Road provides an unlikely community resource.
I made this short doc in the winter of 2015-16 at The Branch on Brighton’s London Road. I had set out to tackle the changing face of the area more head on – London Road being the (generally pretty charged) gateway between the affluent North Lanes and the city’s indigenous working class who come and go via the street’s line of bus stops – but in the end I made this.
The buying, bulldozing, building, flog it at vast profit way of the property speculators leaves little space for community space beyond the cappuccino bars slotted in to service the young professional incomers. Despite the costs to wallets and livers, old pubs are often the only place isolated older people can congregate and connect with like minded people. It may not suit capitalism but there are reasons societies organised as they did – with collective workplaces, and non work activity. Everyone needs a little lovin’…even cantankerous piss heads…x
Many thanks to Ian and Annie and everyone who drinks at the Branch. Thanks to Jack McGloughlin for some artful a7s shots.
It’s 8 mins.