When television probes youth issues: unemployment, schools, young people emigrating, sectarianism, it wheels in the experts, teachers, politicians, government ministers, clergymen and perhaps even a few token young people…….

But stop….here is the chance for young people from Belfast to say how these issues affect them.  A boring series of talking heads and a few noddy shots?  Not in this programme - instead, an expression of feelings and experiences through drama, music, poetry and photography to present an epic programme which spans the pageantry, the celebration and the protest events in Belfast.
Young people critically and humorously dissect the institutions set up to service them - Cabbages and Kings a song from the young people savagely attacks the educational system - "Backed up con-clusions, endless facts, Classroom whitewash, covering cracks".  The roots of sectarianism are caricatured by the profiteer, the warmonger, the preacher, the educator, "Spiralling downwards till Ireland we come, our words jump to life, defiling the young" they chant.
The programme unfolds as we follow a young street poet who gobs incisive, witty comments at our sacred cows….ten year olds sing their own song of nothing to do, seven days a week….a young boy sings of lost innocence in a nursery rhyme with more sinister connotations….a young graphic artist becomes a character in his own cartoons as he takes to the road to London and relates his experiences of emigrating….we are taken on a photographic tour of Belfast by a young unemployed photographer who captures relevant images for him, we see him photographing a grave yard where he spent a year of his life on a youth training programme writing down inscriptions from grave stones….a poet reflects on the alienation of a young person faced with the disintegration within his community….four teenagers talk from the street corner where they were brutally gunned down and of course there is the obligatory Protestant and Catholic reconciliation weekend….but with a difference.
….And a pre-emptive strike for the critics who will no doubt dismiss the words of the fifty young people who worked on this programme because it doesn't 'show the good side of our 'wee province'….of course not forgetting British attitudes which are humorously portrayed from the person who "just doesn't understand, well it's nowt to do with me" to the British comedians and their anti-Irish jokes.
Produced by Marilyn Hyndman:       Music: Rick O'Shea.       Directed by David Hyndman.

"Fresh and exciting; a mesmerising explosion of energy by a young co-operative video workshop; trying through song and dance, poetry and video art, to break down our preconceptions and show that behind the trouble there is vigour and humour and terrific resilience.  It showed that among the hatred and cynicism there are uncontaminated, talented young people who have the power to make us see a stale situation fresh."
Daily Telegraph

"A remarkable 50 minute video that sets out to show Belfast through the eyes of the young people, satirical and funny but realistic and moving as well."
The Irish News

"Finds and new talent in writer/linkman Marcus Alasdair."
The Independent

"Belfast people feel that they are always on the wrong side of the camera - 'the most photographed, most documented people in the world' - this video seeks to redress the balance, showing Belfast today through the eyes of its young people."
The Guardian

"How to describe it's singing, dancing, speechifying, philosophising and overall mix of optimism and despair defeats me."
Daily Mail

Selection broadcast in European Youth Series RAI 3, 1989. SELECTED TO REPRESENT IRELAND at the Celtic Film Festival 1989. WINNER, JEUNESSE AWARD, Celtic Film Festival 1989. Selected for VideoFest, Berlin 89. Australian Video Festival Award Tapes, Sydney 1989. Film Markt, Oberhausen 1989. Euro Aim Screenings, Donostia 1990. Edinburgh Fringe Film Festival 1990. Toronto Irish Film Festival 1990.