Book review: Film & TV Places of Wales by Celyn Jones & Frances Turpin

Desmond Clifford

Today Wales is justly recognised as a location for film and television drama. The development of mobile technology over the last generation or so has diminished film-makers’ dependence on fixed studio space.

Hollywood has been declining while producers scout the world for suitable locations. Wales has a lot to offer on that front with stunning and variable scenery while never being too far from towns and facilities.

The historical concentration of television production here means there’s a decent skill base on hand. Governments have chipped in with some public money, and film-making is an example of a creative industry which works well in Wales.

Increasingly, as this book illustrates, film-makers have gone Welsh. Going about your business in Cardiff it’s not uncommon to come across film crews working. I once saw Peter Capaldi dressed as Dr Who walking purposefully down the road towards Cardiff city centre. No one so much as batted an eye-lid.

Another day, I saw an episode of Sherlock being filmed around the corner. Film in Wales is a success story of the last generation.

2025 has been the year of Richard Burton. He towers like no other in film and drama. The centenary of his birth inspired the film “Mr Burton” (2025) telling the story of the tutorage and adoption of young Richard Jenkins by his teacher Philip Burton, without which we would never have heard of Richard Burton.

In a general sense, the story was well known but the film injects complexity and humanity into the relationship. It does justice to Philip Burton, seemingly talented but only averagely so. His great achievement – a monument to good teachers everywhere – was to inspire his pupil’s talent and guide him towards exploiting it.

Philip was the lightning conductor. Pontrhydyfen is more than mere background for action. It was essential to the dynamics of the story. Had Burton come from somewhere less characterful, his story and his personal drama wouldn’t have been the same.

This strong sense of place is also evident in a slew of other Welsh films. Submarine (2010), Pride (2014), Set Fire to the Stars (2014) and Madfabulous (2025) evoke Swansea, the Dulais Valley, Swansea again (but masquerading as Dylan Thomas’s New York) and Plas Newydd on Ynys Mon.

Blaenau Gwent

I learnt a few things. An American Werewolf in London (1981), a cult classic – I’m part of the cult – turns out to have been shot in Bannau Brycheiniog, standing in for the Yorkshire Moors. I had no idea.

Nor did I know that part of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005) was shot in Blaenau Gwent.  Scenes from Pembrokeshire will be familiar to fans of Harry Potter (2010, 2011) and Snow White & the Huntsman (2012).

Eryri National Park has made periodic appearances in James Bond movies for more than half a century.

The book argues that it was the re-incarnation of Dr Who in 2005, scripted by the brilliant Russell T Davies, which transported Wales into a new age of TV production. There’s no argument about this.

Over the last twenty years, Wales has come into its own with Dr Who, Torchwood, Sherlock, Gavin & Stacey, His Dark Materials and others all made here.

In Cardiff it’s practically routine to stumble across film crews while Gavin & Stacey did for Barry what football has done for Wrexham. It’s gratifying to see Wales represented positively and film production plays to the country’s strengths.

The Welsh Government needs to help the industry sustain a long-term infrastructure in a highly competitive field.  Wales has an edge, and we need to keep it and build on it.

The Prisoner

It was The Prisoner (1967-68) which first put Wales on the television drama map. Set in Portmeirion, the genius creation of Clough Williams-Ellis, The Prisoner caught early television’s enduring fascination with alienation and mystery recognising, perhaps, the mesmerising power of the medium itself.

The lead character, “Six” – who aspires to be a name and not a number – is caught in a gilded cage while he tries to figure out what his captors want from him. For all its loveliness, there is something out-of-orbit and slightly disorientating about Portmeirion, which is exactly why it’s so interesting. If it wasn’t a touch crazy, The Prisoner wouldn’t have worked.

An important aspect of this book is the celebration of Welsh film-making; as film critic Barry Norman used to say – “and why not!”

The photographs and film stills are the best thing here, short of actually seeing the films. It’s a very clear Book of Evidence of the progress made by the industry over the last generation or so.

Wales has such variety to offer – beaches, hills, mountains, old towns, new towns, castles. Oddly enough, one thing not so simple to re-create these days is Wales’ industrial past, as Marc Evans, director of Mr Burton notes, “we were trying to capture a world that has almost completely disappeared”.

The vaporisation of Welsh industry is striking, if not incredible.

The book makes clear that it’s not a comprehensive compendium of everything made in Wales.

Omissions

Even so, selection matters and there are some notable, not easily understandable, omissions. For example, no mention of the desert scenes filmed at Merthyr Mawr in David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia (1962) – perhaps slipping from fashion a little now but it won seven Oscars, including Best Film.

No mention of Twin Town (1997) starring Rhys and Llyr Ifans, set in Swansea and filmed mostly around Port Talbot. Twin Town is among the most loved Welsh films ever.  No Solomon & Gaenor (1999), filmed across South Wales, and Oscar-nominated.

In the television section, no mention of Hinterland/Y Gwyll (2013), a seminal and influential thriller filmed in Aberystwyth and Ceredigion – the hinterland, indeed.

The series was notable, among other things, for the landscape’s function as, in effect, a character in its own right rather than merely a dramatic setting.

These absences, and there are others, feel a little unsatisfactory and there’re no obvious criteria guiding what is, and what isn’t, included in the book.

As a brochure for what can be done in Wales, the book is very effective. The pictures are lavish and striking. The text is a little thin but serviceable and hopefully will steer people towards watching or re-watching the films and visiting the locations.

It leaves the way open, however, for a fuller history of film in Wales and perhaps someone will be inspired by this volume to take that further step.

Film & TV Places of Wales is published by Seren and can be purchased here and at all good bookshops