From Bedrooms to Billions

2014 "A Scientific Curiosity That Sparked a Revolution"
7.5| 2h42m| en
Details

From Bedrooms to Billions is a 2014 documentary film by British filmmakers Anthony Caulfield and Nicola Caulfield that tells the story of the British video games industry from 1979 to the present day. The film focuses on how the creativity and vision of a relatively small number of individuals allowed the UK to play a key, pioneering role in the shaping of the billion dollar video games industry which today dominates the modern world's entertainment landscape. The film features interviews with major British game designers, journalists and musicians from across the last 30 years.

Director

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Gracious Films

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Reviews

Supelice Dreadfully Boring
Holstra Boring, long, and too preachy.
Tayyab Torres Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.
Lachlan Coulson This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.
lifeschool389107 As a die-hard Commodore 64 and Amiga fan from the UK, it would have to take something monumentally good and extraordinary for me to rate this 10 out of 10, but From Bedrooms delivers. The movie is packed with nostalgia, more than any other film I have ever seen, and begs the watcher to play it again and again - each time discovering more. Everything you would hope for is covered, and more, with two-and-a-half hours of pure nostalgic pleasure.ZX Spectrums! Commodore C64 and the Commodore Amiga feature in this epic journey; from the dawn of the bedroom coder, and those incredibly long type-in magazine listings; leading to modern gaming on the Playstation and PC. From Bedrooms is very historically accurate with facts, and doesn't try to hype myths and stories, but presents everything matter-of-fact and from the people who made it all happen. As UK film-makers, the team guide the story mainly in terms of UK development, and focus closely on the aspects of making computer games which shaped the course of history.Gracious Films have truly delivered a breathtaking Movie, an order of magnitude better than I was ever expecting, and something which any fan from that era would love. It also makes a perfect gift for a best friend on Birthdays and Christmas, so why not order a number of copies and share your discovery to all your friends.
mahatma618 Just finished viewing this,and it made the hair on my back stand up.Apart from a few glaring omissions (probably from people saying no to participate in this documentary rather than the makers not asking) it is a thorough analysis of the emergence of the gaming industry,and takes us through it's ups and downs and rebirth of gaming as we now know it.Conspicuously it rather glazes over the Amiga days,but that is most likely due to the up coming new documentary from the creators of this.Can't praise this enough.Having lived through the 8-bit days,and later the 16-bit (read Amiga),it really is like revisiting the glory days.One last thing:The ending is one of the best I've seen in a documentary.Go on,give this one a try.
tmakarowrow If you're reading this, you're a kindred spirit. A fan of classic games, and game history. A passionate soul, and as such will not need too much in the way of description. Just simply know if you are of that ilk, this Documentary is one of the best of the topic of gaming history, and just unmatched in terms of the UK industry. It just covers just about all you would want it to and all you can reasonably expect it to unless it was to become a TV series. From the games to the people behind them, to those magazines you loved of the time, it's superbly done. There are slight omissions there, but very few and to bring those up would be very nit picky indeed. It is just a stunning labour of love. And opt for the special edition, and you will get another disc featuring interviews and extended interviews with many of those on the first disc, covering some of those old favourites like Elite and Sentinel. There aren't many Documentaries that cover the UK market, although there are a couple that do the US one quite well. This well and truly fixes that, and goes on to be probably the best one ever done in my opinion. I was so close to giving this 10/10. If you have a passion for this subject you have to have this. Enough said.
lifeschool233792 As you can see from my score, this movie is not just perfect, it is mind blowing. (I give it 9.5 but the rating system doesn't do .5). Compared to the AVGN movie you may have seen put about these days, this movie is actually AWESOME. Let me explain.In order to get an idea of the history of retro machines, first you must present the story from the eyes of the kids and teens who made the games, and why they made them. Then you must bring in the story of the UK games industry, moving through the BBC and ZX spectrum range, and the frontier of Memory Vs the imagination. Then the Commodore C64, and the frontier of audio. Finally the Amiga, as the final frontier of game-play and graphics. Then 'the console gap' which lead to the modern day; where games are now versions of revisions. In short, this documentary covers it all, from the eyes of the makers who made it happen. Rather than an emotional roller-coaster, instead this is a soft and gentle deep thread of fascination from end to end. Everything about Crash and Zzap64! is in there; which was written by young adults of my own age-group (something I didn't realise at the time!), and even though every topic is here, we as an audience get the feeling of only just skimming the surface.The games are far and wide (I recognised about half), and include many hits from the three big machines, ZX, C64, Amiga. (NES and SEGA also feature, as well as PS4). In the Amiga section they feature many 3D games: such as Stunt Car Racer, Midwinter and Mercenary III. I thought the Amiga content flew by quite quickly, but there were a lot of Amiga guys throughout the whole movie, talking about the general idea and logistics of producing games.The whole production feels like it was produced with so much love and affection, the homage to the period so vivid it's almost as though its still here with us. A time when we could all be friends, together as gamers, having fun, living a dream. If you are reading this message, YOU were there; now you can relive those times again and again forever.The extra material in the Special Edition is also worth a look for C64 and Amiga fans, with Jon Hare on Sensi Soccer (5mins), Mike Montgomtery on creating Speedball 2 (almost 6mins). The making of Shadow of the Beast (8mins), Peter Molyneux on Populous (15mins). David Braben talks about the original Elite (31mins), plus there are a rake of C64 related materials, including 17mins of Geoff Crammond talking about The Sentinel, and his time on the BBC Micro with games like Super Space Invaders and Revs. And even an extended interview with the legend Matthew Smith and his days with Manic Miner (6mins). Plus more! As you can tell, I think this is the most glorious tribute to that whole period, period! So gather all your friends around and make this a celebration. This one is definitely worth watching.