marvels most female empowered film films in dagenham
Finally, back in theatres, Hollywood’s dominant film franchise posted the biggest opening of the pandemic era as Marvel spinoff “Black Widow” ruled last weekend’s box office. The long-awaited film sees Scarlett Johansson play the ‘Black Widow’ in a solo spy adventure long before she becomes an avenger.
The film embraces both on-screen and off-screen female empowerment, with a majority female cast of directors who helped bring a more nuanced and relatable MCU film for the female audience. As one of the most female focussed Marvel films created, remembering the impact of the Ford Dagenham women sewing machinists who protested for the right to equal pay.
One of the buildings used for the “Black Widow” set, building D37 at Londoneast-UK, has since been converted into the new ‘world-leading research facility, which is UCL’s Pearl.
It was very apt for Marvel’s “Black Widow” crew to base themselves for six weeks in Dagenham at Londoneast-UK, hosted by the boroughs film office, Film LBBD over the summer in 2019. The borough’s future residents MBS Lighting and studio owners Hackman Capital Partners (HCP) provided lighting and equipment.
Darren Smith, Managing Director MBS Group UK & Europe, says, “We’re extremely proud of all the productions we support, including the recent filming of Black Widow. It’s exciting to be working with Barking and Dagenham, to share our industry understanding and to help create opportunity, which stands to benefit the entire community”.
The Location Manager for the film, Aurelia Thomas, expressed how, “It was an absolute pleasure filming at Londoneast-UK in Dagenham back in 2019 and Lisa, Jayne and the LBBD team were extremely helpful!”
Head of Film (Film LBBD) at Barking and Dagenham, Lisa Dee said: “This is the third time Marvel have filmed with Film LBBD in Dagenham, ahead of the new studios being built, this is a great example of global production ‘choosing’ to film in Barking and Dagenham.
“Black Widow was particularly special for us to work on, director Cate Shortland and the production team, had a clear vision of what they wanted to achieve, and we were so pleased to be able to assist them in delivering that.
She continued: “Personally, having a super bad-ass female cast and an amazing director at the helm of it – I was only sad not to be cast as a stand-in widow (next time maybe!)”
Leader of Barking and Dagenham Council, Councillor Darren Rodwell, said: “Barking and Dagenham used to be famous for making cars, now we are the Hollywood of the capital.
“We are proud of our partnership with MBS/Hackman to build film studios in our borough and hope that this collaboration will bring more films to the borough and more job opportunities for local people.”
Bringing high-scale films to Barking and Dagenham will allow more job opportunities for local people to gain experience on set, whether that is through marshalling or as a runner. The production, during their occupation, also recruited a former student of Dagenham Park School, Inam Choudhury, via Film LBBD to work on the filming shoot as a trainee marshal. By day three Inam was promoted to production assistant and continued to work on Black Widow for the rest of the shoot.
