Treasure trove of vintage 1940s movies on 16mm rescued from house clearance by Harrogate Film Society
It's a story about film or, to be specific, very rare films, which deserves to be made into a film itself, one that would have to be based in Harrogate.
How a large cache of lost vintage movies from the pre-digital age of cinema built up by a film collector in the post-World War Two era was discovered in his house after he died, then rescued by members of Harrogate Film Society before, finally, being given a safe home at the BFI in London.
When members of Harrogate Film Society were invited to a house clearance in Harrogate following the passing of movie fan George Faulkner, they had no idea what they were in for.
His grieving son Mark had mentioned there night be some 16mm feature film reels from the time now long ago when father and son would travel to film fairs across the north of England.
There might be as many as 40 dusty old reels, he added, stored away in the family home from the days when they would watch movies at home on an old-fashioned film projector
But, when Tim Heaton, who at that point was on Harrogate Film Society’s committee, searched carefully through the late Mr Faulkner’s old movie collection, he discovered there were actually more like 400 films.
Straight away, the film society realised there night be some very rare movies there from cinema’s golden age.
The big fear was they would all end up in a skip or be left to rot.
Time was of the essence and Tim Heaton and a group of volunteers from Harrogate Film Society had to ascertain and itemise what they had discovered, then find somewhere safe – temporarily – to store these fragile pieces of celluoid history.
And then decide what to do with the decades-old reels in the long run.
Tim Heaton said: “We were asked by George’s son Mark if we were interested in about 40 16mm feature film reels.
"But they had to be collected by Sunday.
"The reality was there a huge number of old movies, some famous at the time they had been released, others forgotten or obscure.
"We needed six pallets to get them all out of the house.”
Most of the 16mm reels were black and white British films from the 1930s to the 1950s era.
Robin Hood, Calling Bulldog Drummond, Charge of the Light Brigade, The Last of the Mohicans, The 38 Steps and many, many more.
Harrogate Film Society felt sure that someone would want to preserve at least the rarest of these precious but fragile films.
They decided to put out a polite SOS about what they had found in the home of the late George Faulkner and contacted the British Film Institute in London for advice.
Tim Heaton said: "We stored the reels for safe keeping at a business in Thorp Arch.
"They provided warehousing and meeting rooms so we could catalogue the reels.
"It was the catalogue that we sent out to interested parties that generated interest.
"They could evaluate what we had, otherwise I think BFI and The Cinema Museum would have struggled to see what was of value.
"As it turned out, nothing went to the skip, which in many ways was the final great outcome."
It was a proud moment when the BFI’s archives department agreed to take and, importantly, preserve three complete 16mm films.
The World Owes Me A Living (British 1945 war drama), A Case for PC 49 (British 1951 crime drama) and, interestingly, Uneasy Terms (British 1948 detective thriller).
The latter stars Michael Rennie who was born in Harrogate in 1909 and went on to be a major Hollywood star.
It also emerged that The World Owes Me a Living was on the BFI’s ‘Most Wanted' list of movies that were not currently preserved in the archives.
The remainder of the 16mm reels are going to The Cinema Museum in London, together with a collection of vintage film magazines also found in Mr Faulkner’s house.
A small volunteer-run establishment dedicated to the glory days of "going to the pictures" from before the days of the multiplex cinema, The Cinema Museum is located in the last remaining part of the former Lambeth Workhouse where as a small child, Charlie Chaplin lived for a time.
A self-funded set-up, like Harrogate Film Society, its only purpose is to cherish both movies and movie history.