Source Programme of Events Spring 2019 The Source Arts Centre Programme Spring 2019_Layou | Page 4

Spring 2019
TY
A Bloody
Q
N History
Acclaimed British director Mike Leigh’s new
film ‘Peterloo’ shines on the big screen
during this season’s programme of films
‘Peterloo’ is a true story
which details a public
protest march which
took place in St. Peter’s
Field, Manchester on the
16th of August in 1819
that became infamous
after an attack by a
regiment of the 15th
Hussars. At the end of
the day, 15 people lay
dead and anywhere between 400 and 700
hundred people were injured in the clash.
The marchers up to 80,000 strong were
calling for a reform of parliament that would
boost representation in an area that was
suffering under an ongoing employment crisis.
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The Source Arts Centre
Leigh’s film offers a diffuse focus – looking at
a variety of characters involved: Henry Hunt
(Rory Kinnear), the orator who spoke on the
day; Maxine Peake as a mother trying to hold
her family together in the face of extreme
poverty and Joseph, a traumatised young
man who, four years earlier, after the battle
of Waterloo, made his way home to the north
of England, still wearing his army red coat,
only to find hardship.
Mill owners are cutting wages. Bread is being
taxed. People are starving. But on the other
hand, the famed Duke of Wellington has just