Description

Line to the Stars. Sixty Years of Filming at the Bluebell Railway.

Paperback Book

By HEIDI MOWFORTH. Paperback book 16.5cm wide x 23.3cm high x 1cm deep. 128 pages.
Lavishly illustrated throughout with black & white and colour photos.

From the very first filming contract in 1961, the Bluebell Railway in Sussex has hosted myriad film and TV stars over more than six decades. The Bluebell Railway has travelled the world and  become numerous different stations, both real and fictional, with a variety of famous characters and many adventures along the way. This book explores that journey through a series of feature films, films for TV, classic detective dramas, factual/educational programmes, commercials, pop videos, costume dramas and much more besides, including The Innocents, (1961); the BBC production of Anne Karenina; No Hiding Place; The Who film Tommy (1975); the BBC adaptation of Anne of Green Gables; Colditz; Edward & Mrs Simpson and the demob scenes for the final episode of It Ain’t Half Hot Mum in 1981 among many others. Tastes have changed over the decades, as have the way that films are made and how we can watch them. What hasn’t changed, even with the advent of CGI, is that when producers want historic trains in a historic setting, nothing seems to look quite as good as a real train in an authentic location. That’s where the Bluebell Railway – the line to the stars – comes  into its own.

Author Heidi Mowforth has volunteered at the Bluebell Railway since 1981. She is a steam locomotive driver who has regularly driven on the Kent & East Sussex Railway and North Norfolk Railway. Heidi was the first woman in Britain to have driven more than 140 different steam locomotives, which she considers her greatest achievement.