The Railway in Television and Film
The 1977 television film version of Silver Blaze used the railway.
The 1978 film version of The Thirty Nine Steps was partly filmed on the railway—specifically, the scenes where Hannay (Robert Powell) hangs from Victoria Bridge. The scene is supposed to be set in Scotland, and the landscape is very out of place for that area.
Portions of The Seven-Per-Cent Solution were filmed on the railway.
The BBC TV children's series God's Wonderful Railway (1980) was filmed on the SVR.
Bridgnorth station was used in 1981 as part of a sketch for the TV comedy Not the Nine O'Clock News. In the sketch, Mel Smith's character observes a steam train passing by without stopping and refers to it as an "old chuffer", forming part of a sequence of puns around the protagonist's wife.
In 1984, scenes for the BBC TV series The District Nurse were filmed at Bewdley station. Also in 1984, Arley station was used for the BBC TV adaptation of The Box of Delights.
The SVR featured in the BBC TV's 1987 adaptation of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple novel 4.50 From Paddington. Scenes were shot in and around Bewdley station.
Scenes featuring LMS 4MT no. 43106 were included in the 1987 TV serial Knights of God.
The railway was used for the 1990s sitcom Oh, Doctor Beeching!, featuring Paul Shane, Su Pollard and Jeffrey Holland. The exterior shots for the series were filmed in Arley station, where a false row of cottages was temporarily erected in the goods yard.
Bewdley station doubled for "Hilton" railway station in the Merchant Ivory Productions 1992 film of Howards End (film) by E.M. Forster.
The ITV family drama Goodnight Mister Tom had its station sequences filmed in early spring at Arley—for which trains ran through without stopping for two weeks.
In the 2005 film, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe GWR Manor no. 7802 Bradley Manor appeared with the train that brought the Pevensies to the nearest station to the Professor's house.
Victoria Bridge appears briefly in the 2011 film Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows when Holmes pushes Dr Watson's wife, Mary, off a train as it goes over a bridge.
Bewdley and Kidderminster, locomotive 42968, and the rake of LNER coaches will feature in sequences for Dancing on the Edge, a five-part dramatisation by Stephen Poliakoff, filmed in February 2012 for the BBC autumn schedules.
Read more about this topic: Severn Valley Railway
Famous quotes containing the words railway, television and/or film:
“Her personality had an architectonic quality; I think of her when I see some of the great London railway termini, especially St. Pancras, with its soot and turrets, and she overshadowed her own daughters, whom she did not understand—my mother, who liked things to be nice; my dotty aunt. But my mother had not the strength to put even some physical distance between them, let alone keep the old monster at emotional arm’s length.”
—Angela Carter (1940–1992)
“Never before has a generation of parents faced such awesome competition with the mass media for their children’s attention. While parents tout the virtues of premarital virginity, drug-free living, nonviolent resolution of social conflict, or character over physical appearance, their values are daily challenged by television soaps, rock music lyrics, tabloid headlines, and movie scenes extolling the importance of physical appearance and conformity.”
—Marianne E. Neifert (20th century)
“Lay not that flattering unction to your soul,
That not your trespass but my madness speaks;
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place,
Whilst rank corruption, mining all within,
Infects unseen.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)