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I've been trying to find a specific ~5-minute clip I was somewhere in 2005 for years. I was shown on the BBC's "Homegrown Hollywood", which was a fairly obscure anthology of British-made short films about a variety of topics, mostly by small independent film-makers, from "art films" to short documentaries. It had quite a bit of good stuff (and also quite a bit of not so good stuff, it was very mixed). The specific clip is about two old women reminiscing about their husbands, both of whom died during the battle of Britain decades ago, ending with both in tears and "you never quite let go, do you?" I felt it was a very powerful statement about the long-lasting effects of war that go well beyond the immediate casualties and victims, at the time probably directed towards the Iraq war, but it really applies to all wars. There is almost zero information about this, including at the BBC Archives as far as I can determine, probably because the clip itself wasn't actually produced by the BBC. I suspect I will never find it again, and that it was seen by relatively few people in the first place since the programme aired at 2am (I found some other clips they aired, such as Toothpaste[1] and a few others, but not this one). To this day, in spite of being very short, it's still one of the best and most impactful things I've seen on TV. One can't help but wonder how much fantastic material is out there, seen by only a small audience, only to be lost and never seen again. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSAsn9u3e8U |
A lot of BBC content like that is just gone because they used to reuse tapes to save on costs. I don't know if they were still doing it into the 2000s but entire chunks of iconic TV shows like a third of the first six Doctor Who seasons are just straight up gone [1].
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who_missing_episodes