GB
1968
2hrs 24mins
Dir: Ken Hughes
Starring: Dick Van Dyke and Sally Ann Howes
An eccentric inventor creates a flying car with magical properties
This classic and now highly popular family musical features a surprisingly good railway scene whereby the car rides alongside a rather wacky-looking GWR train. Filmed on the Hollywater Loop of the Longmoor Military Railway and using Hunslet WD ‘Austerity’ 0-6-0ST No.196, the loco was given a tall dummy chimney and a copper-painted dome, with the letters ‘GWR’ painted on the tanks in elaborate Pullman-style font. This is made even odder by the two Southern coaches in tow, both of which were also painted blue and branded ‘GWR’. Another scene where the Vulgarian spies hang a fake bridge backdrop from the parapet of an actual railway bridge was filmed at Ilmer, just northwest of Princes Risborough, on the double track GW&GC Joint main line to Bicester.
