The Home-Made Car

Last updated

The Home-made Car
The Home-made Car film Opening titles (1963).png
Opening titles
Directed by James Hill
Screenplay byJames Hill
Edited byAnn Chegwidden
Music by Ron Grainer
Production
company
British Petroleum Company
Release date
  • 1963 (1963)
Running time
28 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

The Home-Made Car is a 1963 British silent short film directed and written by James Hill. [1] It was produced by The British Petroleum Company (BP), which continues to distribute the film. [2]

Contents

A young man rebuilds a vintage car and finds love.

Plot

A young man sets to work restoring a vintage car at the home of his aunt. The little girl who lives next door is intent on sabotaging his project at any cost, but when he wins her over with a smile, she ends up helping him to build it. He completes the project and wins the hand of the girl’s older sister, who has been dating a mannerless local who tears around in a sports car.

Cast

Production

Locations

The film was shot largely in and around Farnborough, Hampshire, and Cove, Hampshire. The car was rebuilt at Blackwell Cottage, Cambridge Road West, Farnborough. The house remains, although the garage has been replaced by a detached house, now number 26. The house where the little girl lived, next door, is also still there. As well as Farnborough, parts of the filming took place at the petrol station in Bucks Horn Oak, Hampshire and Seale, Surrey.

The car

The owner of the Bullnose Morris in the film, Eric Longworth, kept the car until his death in 2011. The car is now owned by Stuart Cooke of Darwen Lancashire. When the film was shot, the car had already been fully restored, so the chassis of another car which Eric was restoring at the time, a rare 1916 Perry, was used to replicate the Morris during restoration.

The featured sports car, registration VWK 929, is a white late '50s Austin-Healey 100-6 with red interior.

Music

The music was by Ron Grainer and includes a pastiche of the theme from Steptoe and Son when an old rag and bone man tries to steal the front wings and radiator shell from the still incomplete car.

Accolades

The film was nominated for a 1964 Academy Award (Short Subjects, Live Action Subjects), [3] and won a Silver Bear (Short Film) at the 1963 Berlin International Film Festival. [4]

Cult success

The film became a cult success when regularly broadcast as a trade test colour transmission on the run up to the start of BBC2 colour transmissions. [5] Originally screened from September 1968 until August 1973, it was one of a series of short films broadcast to help television engineers set up new colour television sets. Others were The North Sea Quest, Overhaul, Crown of Glass, Roads to Roam, The Small Propeller, The Cattle Carters, Prospect for Plastics, A Journey into the Weald of Kent, Giuseppina and Evoluon.

Home media

The Home Made Car has been released by the BFI as an extra on DVD/Blu-ray discs of Hill's film Lunch Hour (1962), together with two short films from the 1970s also directed by Hill, Giuseppina and Skyhook.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MG cars</span> Car brand and former British car company

MG is a British automotive marque founded by Cecil Kimber in the 1920s, and M.G. Car Company Limited was the British sports car manufacturer existing between 1930 and 1972 that made the marque well known. Since 2007, the marque is controlled by Chinese state-owned automaker SAIC Motor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TVR</span> British manufacturer of sports cars

TVR Electric Vehicles Limited is a British manufacturer of sports cars. The company manufactures lightweight sports cars with powerful engines and was, at one time, the third-largest specialised sports car manufacturer in the world, offering a diverse range of coupés and convertibles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Farnborough, Hampshire</span> Town in Hampshire, England

Farnborough is a town located in the Rushmoor district of Hampshire, England. It has a population of around 57,486 as of the 2011 census and is an important centre of aviation, engineering and technology. The town is probably best known for its association with aviation, including the Farnborough International Airshow, Farnborough Airport, Royal Aircraft Establishment, and the Air Accidents Investigation Branch.

<i>The Love Bug</i> 1969 film directed by Robert Stevenson

The Love Bug is a 1969 American sports adventure comedy film directed by Robert Stevenson from a screenplay by Bill Walsh and Don DaGradi, based on the story "Car, Boy, Girl" by Gordon Buford. The film is the first installment in the Herbie film series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aldershot</span> Town in Hampshire, England

Aldershot is a town in the Rushmoor district, Hampshire, England. It lies on heathland in the extreme north-east corner of the county, 31 mi (50 km) south-west of London. The town has a population of 37,131, while the Aldershot Urban Area – a loose conurbation, which also includes other towns such as Camberley and Farnborough– has a population of 243,344; it is the thirtieth-largest urban area in the UK.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cooper Car Company</span> British car manufacturer

The Cooper Car Company was a British car manufacturer founded in December 1947 by Charles Cooper and his son John Cooper. Together with John's boyhood friend, Eric Brandon, they began by building racing cars in Charles's small garage in Surbiton, Surrey, England, in 1946. Through the 1950s and early 1960s they reached motor racing's highest levels as their mid-engined, single-seat cars competed in both Formula One and the Indianapolis 500, and their Mini Cooper dominated rally racing. The Cooper name lives on in the Cooper versions of the Mini production cars that are built in England, but is now owned and marketed by BMW.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holden Torana</span> Motor vehicle

The Holden Torana is a mid-sized car that was manufactured by Holden from 1967 to 1980. The name apparently comes from a word meaning "to fly" in an unconfirmed Aboriginal Australian language. The original HB series Torana was released in 1967 and was a four-cylinder compact vehicle closely based on the British Vauxhall Viva HB series of 1966–1970.

Castrol Limited is a British oil company that markets industrial and automotive lubricants, offering a wide range of oil, greases and similar products for most lubrication applications. The company was originally named CC Wakefield; the name Castrol was originally just the brand name for CC Wakefield's motor oils, but the company eventually changed its name to Castrol when the product name became better-known than the original company name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bugatti Type 18</span> Motor vehicle

The Bugatti Type 18, also called the Garros, is an automobile produced from 1912 through 1914. Produced shortly after the start of the business, the design was something of a relic. It had much in common with the cars Ettore Bugatti had designed for Deutz Gasmotoren Fabrik but with the radiator of the Type 13. Only seven examples were built, and three are known to survive.

<i>Miracle in Lane 2</i> 2000 American TV series or program

Miracle in Lane 2 is a 2000 American biographical sports drama film starring Frankie Muniz, Rick Rossovich, Molly Hagan, and Patrick Levis. The film is based on the life of Justin Yoder, who was the first person with a disability to compete in the All American Soapbox Derby. It was released as a Disney Channel Original Movie (DCOM).

<i>The Fast Lady</i> 1962 British film by Ken Annakin

The Fast Lady is a 1962 British comedy film, directed by Ken Annakin and starring James Robertson Justice, Leslie Phillips, Stanley Baxter, Kathleen Harrison, and Julie Christie. The screenplay was by Henry Blyth and Jack Davies, based on the 1925 novel The Fast Lady by Keble Howard. It was the third in a trilogy of comedies written by Jack Davies that Annakin made for Independent Artists.

<i>La Collectionneuse</i> 1967 French film

La Collectionneuse is a 1967 French comedy-drama film directed by Éric Rohmer. The third entry in his Six Moral Tales series, it is his first film in colour.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maserati Tipo 151</span> Motor vehicle

The Maserati Tipo 151 is a racing car manufactured by Italian automobile manufacturer Maserati for the 1962 LeMans season to compete in the experimental GT car class. Three cars were built in total, one for Johnny Simone of Maserati France with a red exterior colour and white tri-stripes whilst two were built for Briggs Cunningham for his racing team. These cars had a white body with two blue stripes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Conservation and restoration of road vehicles</span>

Conservation and restoration of road vehicles is the process of restoring a vehicle back to its original working condition. Vehicles, whether partially scrapped or completely totaled, are typically restored to maintain their roadworthiness or to preserve those with antique status for use as showpieces.

<i>Giuseppina</i> 1960 British short film by James Hill

Giuseppina is a 1960 short British documentary film produced by James Hill. It was filmed in 1959, in Mandriole, Emilia-Romagna, near Ravenna in the north east of Italy. It won the Academy Award for Best Documentary. Production of the film was sponsored by the British Petroleum company (BP), which also distributed the film. The BP webpage summarizes the film as, "set at an Italian petrol station where various characters pass through on their onward journey, while entertaining and playing with the attendant's daughter, Giuseppina."

Trade test colour films were broadcast by the television network BBC2 in the early days of colour television in Britain during the long periods of the daytime when no regular programming was scheduled, with the exception of Play School. The goal of these transmissions was to provide colour broadcasting in these intervals for use by television shops and engineers to install, adjust and demonstrate their television sets. The earliest such transmission was made in 1956 but regular all-day-long films ran from autumn 1967 until 24 August 1973. In all, 158 different films were broadcast; on average, each film was shown 90 times. The colour films provided moving colour images to allow tv dealers to demonstrate sets to customers. The decision to stop showing them followed the extension of broadcasting hours on BBC1 and ITV. This, together with the gradual move of schools programmes into colour, meant there was less need to provide moving pictures during trade tests simply to demonstrate sets.

James Hill was a British film and television director, screenwriter and producer whose career spanned 52 years between 1937 and 1989, best remembered for his documentaries and short subjects such as Giuseppina and The Home-Made Car, and as director of the internationally acclaimed Born Free.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bucks Horn Oak</span> Human settlement in England

Bucks Horn Oak is a small village in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England and is the main community within Alice Holt Forest. A small eastern part consists of buildings facing its main road and of the main management and tourist sites of the surrounding public forest, postally part of the place. In the Church of England the community and all land as far as Bentley railway station (Hampshire) is in a parish mainly in Surrey, a larger community on the north-east of the forest, Rowledge. In the secular, civil parishes in England, it is in the parish of Binsted, equating to the third tier of local government, namely Binsted Civil Parish Council.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">W Motors Lykan HyperSport</span> Lebanese limited production sports car

The Lykan HyperSport is a Lebanese limited-production sports car manufactured by W Motors, a United Arab Emirates-based company, founded in 2012 in Lebanon with the collaboration of Lebanese and Italian engineers. It is the first sports car to be designed indigenously in the Middle East; however, the bodywork, chassis and engine were all produced in Germany and assembled in Italy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Farnborough Hill</span> Private day school in Farnborough, Hampshire, England

Farnborough Hill is a Roman Catholic private day school located in Farnborough, Hampshire. The school educates girls aged 11-18. It was established by the Religious of Christian Education order of nuns in 1889 and moved to the current site when the order purchased the house and grounds in 1927. It is now set in an expansive park including Grade I Listed buildings.

References

  1. "The Home-Made Car". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 14 August 2024.
  2. "BP Video Library", webpage retrieved 2008-06-18.
  3. "The 36th Academy Awards (1964) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. 5 October 2014. Retrieved 1 June 2019.
  4. "The Home-Made Car (Das selbstgebastelte Auto)". Berlin International Film Festival. Retrieved 14 August 2024.
  5. Keys, Andrew (2007). "The Statistician's Guide to Trade Test Colour Films", webpage of the "Test Card Circle" website archived at WebCite from this original URL 2008-06-18.