X-Nico

7 unusual facts about British Transport Films


British Rail APT-E

British Transport Films (1975) E for Experimental republished 2006 by the British Film Institute on DVD as part of British Transport Films Collection (Vol. 3): Running A Railway.

British Transport Films

The unit won many awards over the years, including an Academy Award in 1966 for the film Wild Wings, which had little to do with transport and concentrated on WWT Slimbridge in Gloucestershire, founded by Peter Scott.

BTF also produced the controversial The Finishing Line (1976) and Robbie (1979), which warned children against trespassing on railway lines and are often thought of as Public Information Films.

Geoffrey Jones

Jones's first major work for British Transport Films was the 1963 film Snow, an eight minute short demonstrating how the railway network coped with the 1963 "Big Freeze".

Geoffrey Jones (27 November 1931 – 21 June 2005) was a British documentary film director and editor, noted for his contributions to the genre of the industrial film, and in particular British Transport Films.

Stewart McAllister

Following the death of Humphrey Jennings in 1950, McAllister began working for the British Transport Films unit, under Edgar Anstey.

Wild Wings

Wild Wings is a 1966 British short documentary film directed by Patrick Carey and John Taylor and produced by British Transport Films.


Hartfield railway station

The station appears in a delightful British Transport Film entitled Farmer Moving South, which recounted the moving of the entire farm stock of Sir Robert Ropner by special train from Skutterskelfe Hall in Yorkshire to Hartfield in December 1950.

Hunstanton railway station

Opened in 1862, the station was the northern terminus of the King's Lynn to Hunstanton line immortalised by John Betjeman in the British Transport Film John Betjeman Goes By Train.

The Maggie

It was produced by Ealing Studios, at a time when rural Scotland was seen as a popular backdrop for light family entertainment (other examples include I Know Where I'm Going!, Whisky Galore! and Geordie, and British Transport Films such as The Coasts of Clyde).

Watton-at-Stone railway station

In 1977, track in the vicinity of the then closed station was used by British Transport Films as a set to film the notorious public information film The Finishing Line.


see also

Advanced Passenger Train

Republished 2006 by the British Film Institute on DVD as part of British Transport Films Collection (Vol. 3): Running A Railway.