1960s epidemic movie’s an unlikely, but topical, hit with film buffs
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They’re showing some great films at Widcombe Social Club on Saturday nights. The list of forthcoming big screen attractions includes The African Queen, 2001 A Space Odyssey, On the Waterfront, The Comic Strip Presents and The Shining.
Co-hosted by Bath Comedy, not all the films are comedic but the Pearl and Dean retro ads shown in the first half are a hoot.
Glamorous tobacco products feature heavily and everyone fell about when our friend and serial Wine Arts Trail host Lorraine Chase delivered her immortal Luton Airport line.
Lorraine never ceases to oblige fans and autograph hunters by repeating her catchphrase ad infinitum and very kindly sanctioned the showing of the timeless commercial.
Don’t you ever get fed up with saying it, I asked?
Don’t knock it darling she replied in her familiar Cockney tones, and I remembered the lovely little Georgian house that she has tucked away in a salubrious South London suburb.
One of the films that engendered particular interest recently was 80,000 Suspects.
This is a torrid drama set against a smallpox epidemic, filmed in fabulous black and white in our own dear city.
It was hugely entertaining to spot the locations and to compare 1960s Bath with today (blackened buildings, no traffic and everyone wearing a mackintosh!)
The film starts with a New Year’s Eve party in the Pump Room.
Blimey, bring back those days, it was an impossibly glamorous affair and of course guests ended up falling drunkenly into the Roman baths.
What’s more, it seems one could park one’s Ford Zodiac right outside the door!
It snowed on the first day of filming and the production team were worried about continuity should there be a thaw so several tankers of fake snow were sent down from Pinewood overnight.
They needn’t have worried, the snow heralded a historic cold snap which saw the cast wading through drifts up to their knees throughout the film.
Another scene features an old chap selling the Bath Evening Chronicle in Abbey Churchyard.
They had to include him as he apparently refused to move from his pitch.
Special epidemic-related fake editions were printed for him to wave at the cameras.
How much would one of those be worth in an auction today?
Being an avid film trivia buff I spotted a familiar chubby face amongst the extras queueing for inoculation outside Bath Pavilion.
Extensive research revealed that this was an uncredited appearance by Graham Moffat who as a lad famously starred as Albert in the Will Hay films and appeared in scores of other movies in his short life, invariably billed as Britain’s Favourite Fat Boy!
He was semi-retired and landlord of The Englishcombe Inn at the time.
Now that is classic film trivia! This was his final appearance on the silver screen as he sadly died a couple of years after filming.
You would think that a movie about a deadly epidemic would be the last thing people would currently want to see.
But such was the demand for tickets, they are showing it again on October 3rd. For details of advance booking, visit their website at www.widcombesocialclub.co.uk/