Oranges and Sunshine

Producer	Emile Sherman, Camilla Bray, Iain Canning
Director	Jim Loach
Release Date	21-Oct-2011
Cast	Hugo Weaving, Emily Watson, David Wenham, Tara Morice

Between the 1950s and ’70s 150,000 children in the protection of social services were methodically deported to Australia. There many of them underwent appalling abuse at orphanages sponsored by the British Government. This is the subject of Oranges and Sunshine: a title drawn from spurious promises given to the children on their departure. Margaret Humphreys, a social worker from Nottingham, uncovers one of the most significant social scandals in recent times: the forced migration of children from the United Kingdom to Australia. Encountering resistance from the British government, facing threats from an Australian Catholic charity responsible for the most grievous abuse and under intense psychological pressure from hundreds of victims hoping to be reunited with their families in the UK, Emily Watson’s Margaret labours indefatigably to repair the damage of decades of incomprehensible suffering.