Secret City

A film about the City of London, the Corporation that runs it, and its role in the economic crisis.

London and the City of London are not the same place. London is a metropolis of 8 million people. The City of London is the famous square mile in the middle, with about 7,000 residents but many more businesses. A Corporation older than Parliament, the City of London has played a key historical role in protecting and promoting the interests of finance capital. Secret City investigates the power wielded by the Corporation of London over British economic policy, through which it sustains London's prime position at the hub of global finance capital - not least through control of the majority of the world's tax havens. The film exposes the Corporation's anti-democratic constitution, the ancient laws which allow it function as a state within a state, and thus to promote an illusory promise of economic growth at the cost of the real economy. Secret City questions the Corporation's role through contributions from Londoners, including scholars, an MP, a businessman, Church people and activists. Participants include Lord Glasman, John McDonnell MP, the Revs. William Taylor (Stamford Hill) and Alan Green (Bethnal Green), Natalie Bennett, Malcolm Matson, Occupy activists, and Professors Doreen Massey, Robin Blackburn, Steven Haseler and Clive Bloom. The film engages with the different 'narratives' that attach to the City through a range of London imagery, including rarely seen archive footage, and extracts from two films about London by independent filmmakers: Anthony Simmons' 'Bow Bells' (1954) and William Raban's 'About Now MMX' (2010). The music is taken from the popular nursery rhyme, 'Oranges and Lemons', heard in numerous different versions, including an original score by Simon Zagorski-Thomas.