hufilmtv1-6, Exercise 3: Nostalgia and the golden age

Model answer (check the method):

Why nostalgia makes judgment hard: people remember the programmes they loved as children, and the memory is tied to feelings about childhood, family and a vanished time. Memory favours the successes and forgets the weak or forgettable output, so the past looks better than it was. Reruns also keep a few titles alive and let the rest fade, which makes a selected handful stand for a whole era.

How to test the claim of a golden age:
1. List everything made in the period, not only what is remembered, using studio catalogues and broadcast schedules.
2. Compare quality indicators: festival awards, contemporary reviews, and audience figures where they exist.
3. Compare with later periods using the same measures.
4. Ask viewers of different ages and backgrounds, not only nostalgic ones.
5. Separate "much loved" from "better made".

Result: a claim such as "the golden age" can stand as "the best remembered", but "the best" needs evidence of comparison.