GENEVIEVE - THE ULTIMATE MOTORING FILM?

Here are 20 facts about Genevieve, the film that nearly every classic enthusiast owes a vast debt:

• The Veteran Car Club assisted the director Henry Cornelius with the star vehicles. Dinah Sheridan and John Gregson, as Wendy and Alan McKim, piloted 1904 a Darracq 10/12 Type O Roadster.
• Only seven years before shooting commenced, the Darracq was languishing in an East London scrapyard.
• Kay Kendall as ‘Rosalind Peters’ and Kenneth More as her would-be boyfriend Ambrose Claverhosue favoured a 1905 Spyker 12/16-HP Double Phaeton.
• A limited budget meant Cornelius had to extensively shoot on location, with Surrey often doubling for Sussex.
• The final dash towards Waterloo Bridge had the Spyker’s wheels trapped in tramlines. However, London Transport had discontinued trams in July 1952, a few months before filming began, so the crew had to work very quickly as the tracks were being removed.
• The shooting schedule was just 57 days.

• The film’s cinematographer Christopher Challis recalled: “The crew would set off each morning, whatever the weather, and take advantage of whatever turned up. They would often stop to ask an astonished local if he or she knew of a water splash, a sharp left-hand bend or a small pub with a courtyard, depending on what requirements had been forced on us by the weather and the ever-changing schedule”,
• Gregson could not drive before Genevieve and was petrified during those moments when he had to take the wheel.
• Allard provided the 1946 red K1 suffers an unfortunate veteran car-related incident at the gravel pit in Moor Lane near Uxbridge. The factory also installed a special cockpit to accommodate the actor, Reginald Beckwith.
• Genevieve captures the start of the 1952 London to Brighton run, with a guest Movietone’s Leslie Mitchell as himself.
• Wendy and Alan were originally to drive a Humber or a Wolseley while Rosalind and Ambrose would favour a Lanchester.
• The veteran cars pass a Morris-Commercial transporter loaded with fine Cowley products on Kennington Road.
• The Jolly Woodman pub near Burnham Beeches, as visited by Kendall and More, is still very much open.
• Some of the driving scenes had the Darracq on a ‘Queen Mary’ flatbed lorry.
• The Westminster Bridge scene proved so chaotic for the other traffic that the crew was threatened with arrest.
• The ford sequence was shot at Hawkswood Lane near Gerrards Cross.
• The McKims live in Rutland Mews South, SW7
• Cornelius was offered the Darracq after filming ended but could not raise the necessary £450.
• Shortly after Genevieve’s release on the 28^th May 1953, the film critic of The Daily Telegraph’s critic complained the script “has no verbal wit and the characterisation is implausible”.
• The two automotive stars now reside in the Louwman Museum - Zoekresultaten voor “Genevieve” | Louwman Museum.