Underplayed Gems

Small Town Story (1953)

Small Town Story poster
Directed by
Montgomery Tully
Genre
association football film
Country
United Kingdom
Runtime
1h 09m
Rating
5.9 of 10 from 7 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

A thriller set in the world of 1950s association football. A mystery unfolds involving players and commentators. Real-life sports stars appear as themselves.

datedcurioussportymysteriousbreezybritishfadednostalgic

What happens

Small Town Story is a 1953 British thriller, directed by Montgomery Tully and starring Donald Houston and Susan Shaw. The film is set in the world of association football and features appearances from sporting legend Denis Compton and commentator Raymond Glendenning, as well as players from the Arsenal, Millwall and Hayes football teams. It also features the only screen acting credit of Kent Walton, who later to himself become a famous sports commentator. The film soon disappeared from cinemas and its fate was unknown for several decades. The British Film Institute included it on its "75 Most Wanted" list of missing British feature films due to its perceived interest as a sporting period piece, the involvement of stars of the sporting world at the time, its curiosity value as the only known British black-and-white football-set thriller apart from The Arsenal Stadium Mystery, and increasing interest by film historians in Tully as a director. It has now been found, restored and released on DVD. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

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