Wilberforce goes to 'Hullywood'

His latest achievement is a film about William Wilberforce, the Hull MP who won his fight to abolish the British slave trade in 1807.

Director Michael Apted with actors on the set of Amazing Grace

Part of the film was shot at the historic dockyard at Chatham in Kent

Above: Ioan Gruffudd as William Wilberforce and (below) his wife Barbara, played by Romola Garai

All images copyright: Murray Close (C) 2006 Bristol Bay Productions, LLC

Academy-Award winner Michael Apted has made films with some of the world's greatest actors, including Lee Marvin, Sigourney Weaver, Liam Neeson, Dustin Hoffman, Gene Hackman, Oliver Reed and Vanessa Redgrave.
His CV is an impressive list of films and TV programmes – and there are a few blockbusters among them, too.
There's Gorky Park (1983), Gorillas in the Mist (1988) and James Bond's 1999 outing The World is Not Enough. And now there's Amazing Grace (2007).
The film will be released at cinemas across Britain on March 22, but an advanced screening has been organised on February 23 at Hull Screen, on George Street (the same day it's released across the United States). And Apted is pleased for us.
"I hope people in Hull are proud of what Wilberforce achieved," he tells Hull in print.
"It took him [Wilberforce] a long time to achieve his goals, but he had the will and courage to do it and he is a great role model.
"I like Wilberforce because of the way he achieved things through diplomacy and political action.
"Politics has become so discredited over the years, and it's now time we found a heroic figure within it.
"There's a great love story in the film too. Wilberforce met his wife Barbara and married her in about six weeks. They didn't hang around and had six children!"

Meet the cast

In the film, Wilberforce is played by Welsh actor Ioan Gruffudd, who also starred in Titanic, Black Hawk Down and The Fantastic Four.
Veteran actor Albert Finney, a five-time Academy-Award nominee, plays John Newton, the slave ship captain who realised the horror of his work and joined the abolition movement. He also wrote the hymn Amazing Grace, after which the film is named.
Senegalese singer Youssou N'Dour makes his film debut as freed slave Olaudah Equiano. Romola Garai plays Wilberforce's devoted wife, Barbara Spooner.

Learning lessons today

Apted believes the story of Wilberforce's fight to end slavery still has relevance today.
"One of the messages that comes from the way in which the film is marketed is 'don't be too smug', because there are more slaves in the world now than there were then," he says.
"It has the capacity to educate people about ugly things that are going on in our world; things that we are in denial about.
"That could be sports clothes we buy that are made by people in slave conditions in the Third World.
"It's important to entertain people, but within the realms of making something entertaining, it's good to show people things that make them ask questions and maybe influence people."

Hull - a city of inspiration

Apted is well established in Hollywood, but his career began in far less glamorous surroundings.
Born in Buckinghamshire in 1941, he started as a researcher with Granada TV in Manchester in the 1960s. One of his earliest jobs was directing Coronation Street.
Before his latest film, Apted's closest connection to Hull was Yorkshire Television in Leeds, where he once worked.
But last month, he received official honours from our city – with a doctorate from Hull University in recognition of his work.
"The city has been a great inspiration for this film," he says. "We've drawn on materials and artefacts from Hull museums."
Apted admits, however, that locations in London and the historic dockyard at Chatham in Kent, where the Houses of Parliament were painstakingly recreated, were used rather than Hull itself.
Much of the film is set in London as Wilberforce navigates his way through parliamentary politics.
Meanwhile, Apted is willing to add his name to Hull City Council's petition that urges governments to work together to better understand and abolish modern slavery.

To sign the petition and for more information about Wilberforce, visit www.wilberforce2007.com *
For more information about the film, visit www.amazinggracemovie.com *