John Baxter was a director of what today would be called working class dramas.In this film Bransby Williams plays Bill a horse and cart driver for the Local Authority.The council decide to mechanise their vehicles so all the horses are to be sold off.Bill cannot bear to be parted from his horse so he raises the cash to buy him,and then sets off to wander round the country.We see some beautiful countryside locations and also a few views of central London.His first stop is with a circus where we find Tod Slaughter who has designs on the wife of Bills friend.Bill sees him off and moves on to a farm where he plays matchmaker to a local farmer and a neighbouring lady.Finally Bills horse is retired to a stable where Bill gets a job as a stud groom,and thats all there is to it.It is a charming rather old fashioned film.Bransby Williams played in a number of films for John Baxter.he was more known for his playing of Dickens characters.Indeed his appearance in a short version of A Christmas Carol is the first sound version of that book.He like some of the other actors is prone to over act.If you like this sort of film you will find it very entertaining.If you do not then don't bother to view it.
Add a Review
-
malcolmgsw12 February 2011
-
chrischapman-4754525 January 2019It's the late 1930's and internal combustion mechanisation is taking over from horsepower. This is a road trip of a man and his horse but it could have been so much better, especially the middle section of the film which contributes little. Fascinating from a rural viewpoint as horses, and workers, become obsolete but the acting is rather wooden with poor continuity - it feels as if it was staged by a team used to making silent films, often with exaggerated acting, which of course had also recently become obsolete. Its attitude towards women is also typical of the period.
-
boblipton10 August 2023When the council votes to get rid of its horse and carts in favor of motorized lorries, Bransby Williams buys the horse he's been working with and takes to the road to find a place for them both. Yet wherever he goes, he thinks of the friends he makes on the way and pushes them towards new and technological methods.
John Baxter's movie is intensely nostalgic for the old ways, with its images of horse-drawn haying and medicine shows, yet clear-eyed in its understanding that the world requires a head as well as a heart. Williams knows what's what, and forces others into doing what's right for them, even though they are equally willing to sacrifice themselves for him.
I looked at this movie because it has Tod Slaughter in a supporting role, playing a villain yearning for Peggy Novak, but there are other pleasures here, in Jack Parker's bucolic landscapes and the performances of Muriel George, David Burnaby, Percy Parsons and, of course, Polly the Horse.