8mm Forum: 1970's short film question

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Posted by Dave Cragg (Member # 401) on February 24, 2008, 01:55 PM:

Hi All,
wonder if any of my fellow Brits can help me out:
back in the early/mid 70's I remember a short film being shown every morning for a while.
In the film someone bought a scrapped vintage car and painstakingly brought it back to working order. The film ended with the owner driving it off into the distance down a winding country road.
I would watch the car as it disappeared down the winding road each day, wondering if it would get any further that day before the film faded out.
I must have been on my school summer holidays at the time, or perhaps it was before I started school.
Does anyone remember anything about this film, and why it might have been on telly every morning? [Confused]

Thanx,
Dave

Posted by Barry Attwood (Member # 100) on February 25, 2008, 05:27 AM:

Dave,

I remember them, they were actually BP films used as colour test transmissions for BBC2, there were a number of films used, I remember the one you're talking about, there was also a film about colours and pigments, used mainly by arists and the like, mind you I would think we're talking about 35 years ago when this were shown, how time flies.

Posted by Dave Cragg (Member # 401) on February 25, 2008, 12:21 PM:

Excellent, thanks to you I've found this site:

http://www.bvws.org.uk/405alive/info/prog_tradefilms.html
or
http://www.zen77094.zen.co.uk/vintagebroadcasting/bbcttfilms.htm

You can even buy some of these on video/DVD.
I think the one I remember was "a home made car".
Were these films shown so that new owners of colour sets could tune them in properly?

I'd love to get some of these on Super 8. [Roll Eyes]

Dave

Dave

Posted by Barry Attwood (Member # 100) on February 25, 2008, 02:04 PM:

Dave,

This was in the days when BBC2 switched to 625 lines instead of the 405 lines used for B/W television, so these films were used as samples screened regularly so the trade could show off the very exspensive new 625 Colour TV's in the various shops where you could buy or most likely hire your 1st colour TV.

Yes I agree that some of these films would be nice to have on 8mm, but unless there are prints already out there, I doubt if they will ever turn up on 8mm now, do you!

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on March 01, 2008, 12:15 PM:

The film on paint was ICIs "PAINT."

The "car" film was BPs "THE HOME-MADE CAR" made by James Hill and featured the reconstruction of a bull-nosed Morris tourer.

The Montague Motor Museum have most of the BP films but they tell me that they have insufficient funds to bring them out on DVD. They also the Rootes Group motor films and those from Shell.

Maurice

Posted by Mike Peckham (Member # 16) on March 01, 2008, 01:01 PM:

Takes me back, does anyone remember when the announcer used to say "the following programme will be shown in colour..."

I used to think that by some miracle our black and white tv would suddenly show colour pictures!

I was only about 4 at the time... [Roll Eyes]

Mike

Posted by Dave Cragg (Member # 401) on March 01, 2008, 02:22 PM:

Thanks all for your comments.
I believe the "home made car" is sold on video and I will be buying a copy.

Mike, I remember my parents discussing renting a colour telly in the early 1970's. Having only seen a b&w telly up to that point I couldn't imagine colour pictures and thought a colour telly would simply show flashes of colour on the screen rather than a picture, so I was against the idea!

Dave

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