WHAT A CARVE UP!

GB
1961
1hr 27mins
Dir: Pat Jackson
Starring: Sidney James and Shirley Eaton

A mad man starts to kill off members of his family

This comedy horror is in the style of the Carry On films and was loosely based on the 1928 Frank King novel The Ghoul. A previous version titled The Ghoul was filmed in 1933 but was not a success. What a Carve Up! is excellent fun and features an extremely rare shot of an LNWR Special Tank 0-6-0ST arriving at Bradwell station at night. The Special Tanks were a Saddle Tank version of the LNWR DX Goods Class 0-6-0 locos and 278 were eventually built. What is rare is that only five survived into BR ownership in 1948 and all five were in Departmental use as works shunters. They had been withdrawn by 1959 so the footage must have originally been filmed for a much earlier production, possibly in the 1930s. The origin of this stock shot is not known. As a further aside, one of these saddle tanks appears at Wolverton Works in the 1949 Ealing film Train of Events (qv). Bradwell station, meanwhile, was on the short Newport Pagnell branch from Wolverton and closed in 1964.

What a Carve Up! What a shame that the origin of this shot can’t be traced. This is an extremely rare glimpse of an LNWR Special Tank 0-6-0ST arriving into Bradwell station in Buckinghamshire.
Sid James and Kenneth Connor outside a station. Presumably, this too used Bradwell and not a set.