''The End of the Road'' is a 1954 British

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-g ...

directed by

Wolf Rilla Wolf Peter Rilla (16 March 1920 – 19 October 2005) was a film director and writer of German background, although he worked mainly in the United Kingdom. Rilla is known for directing '' Village of the Damned'' (1960). He wrote many books for stu ...

and starring Finlay Currie,

Duncan Lamont Duncan William Ferguson Lamont (17 June 1918 – 19 December 1978) was a British actor.Brian McFarlane (Ed): ''The Encyclopedia of British Film'' (BFI/Methuen • London • 2000) p397''Picture Show Who's Who on the Screen'' (Amalgamated Pre ...

and

Naomi Chance Naomi Chance (born Naomi Freeman, December 1927 – 18 March 2003) was an English film and television actress. Chance was at one time married to the film director Guy Hamilton. She appeared in many television shows, including The Plane Makers, ...

.Chibnall & McFarlane p.249 It was produced by Group Three Films as a

second feature A B movie or B film is a low-budget commercial motion picture. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified films intended for distribution as the less-publicized bottom half of a double featur ...

with funding from the

NFFC Nottingham Forest Football Club is an association football club based in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. Nottingham Forest was founded in 1865 and have been playing their home games at the City Ground, on the banks of the River Trent ...

and distributed by British Lion. It was made at

Beaconsfield Studios Beaconsfield Film Studios is a British television and film studio in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire. The studios were operational as a production site for films in 1922, and continued producing films - and, later, TV shows - until the 1960s. B ...

. The film's sets were designed by the

art director Art director is the title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, film industry, film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to supervise and ...

Michael Stringer.

Plot

A veteran worker at the Jericho Works strongly resists when he has retirement forced upon him by his employers. He says he will retire when he is 90. All he has to show is a small clock as a retirement present which he places on the family mantelpiece. Mick-Mack lives with his son and his wife, and their young son Barnaby ("Barny"). Mick-Mack takes a job as night watchman at the Jericho Works. Meanwhile his son is fired for being late to work. The works decide that only Mick-Mack can resolve the troubles they are having in the

electroplating Electroplating, also known as electrochemical deposition or electrodeposition, is a process for producing a metal coating on a solid substrate through the reduction of cations of that metal by means of a direct electric current. The part to be ...

section. Mick-Mack discovers it is drops of honey (from bees in the roof) which are ruining the process.

Cast

* Finlay Currie as Mick MacAulay, Old 'Mick-Mack' *

as Barney his son *

as Molly his son's wife * Edward Chapman as Works Manager *

Hilda Fenemore Hilda Lilian Fenemore (22 April 1914 – 13 April 2004) was an English actress with a prolific career in film and television from the 1940s to the 1990s. Fenemore played mainly supporting roles which were characterised in her obituary in ''The ...

as Madge the pub landlady * George Merritt as Timekeeper * Gordon Whiting as Young Kennie *

David Hannaford David (; , "beloved one") (traditional spelling), , ''Dāwūd''; grc-koi, Δαυΐδ, Dauíd; la, Davidus, David; gez , ዳዊት, ''Dawit''; xcl, Դաւիթ, ''Dawitʿ''; cu, Давíдъ, ''Davidŭ''; possibly meaning "beloved one". w ...

as Wee Barny * Eugene Leahy as Old Worker *

Edie Martin Edie Martin (1 January 1880 – 22 February 1964) was a British actress. She was a ubiquitous performer, on stage from 1886, playing generally small parts but in high demand, appearing in scores of British films (although often uncredited). ...

as Gloomy Gertie * Pauline Winter as Personnel Manager * Michael Bird as Builder *

Anthony Kilshawe Anthony or Antony is a masculine given name, derived from the ''Antonii'', a ''gens'' ( Roman family name) to which Mark Antony (''Marcus Antonius'') belonged. According to Plutarch, the Antonii gens were Heracleidae, being descendants of Anton, ...

as Manager * Kenneth Henry as Labour Exchange Clerk * Herbert C. Walton as First Old Man * Claude Bonser as Second Old Man *

Sam Kydd Samuel John Kydd (15 February 1915 – 26 March 1982) was a British-Irish actor. His best-known roles were in two major British television series of the 1960s, as the smuggler Orlando O'Connor in '' Crane'' and its sequel ''Orlando''. He als ...

as First Postal Clerk *

Hugh Munro Sir Hugh Thomas Munro, 4th Baronet (16 October 1856 – 19 March 1919), was a British mountaineer best known for his list of mountains in Scotland over 3,000 feet (914.4 m), known as Munros. Born in London, Munro was the fifth child of ...

as Second Postal Clerk * Bert Simms as Crane Driver * John Baker as Foreman *

Ewen Solon Peter Ewen Solon (7 September 1917 – 7 July 1985) was a New Zealand-born actor, who worked extensively in both the United Kingdom and Australia. At the outbreak of World War II, Solon became a member of the First Echelon, 2nd NZEF that sa ...

as Policeman *

Edward Malin Edward Ernest Malin (23 October 1894 in Stoke Newington, London – 1 March 1977 in Ealing, London) was a British actor. He is perhaps most famous for portraying the mute and geriatric Walter in the sitcom '' Nearest and Dearest''. He also h ...

as Nightwatchman

Critical reception

The film historians Steve Chibnall and Brian McFarlane note that ''The End of the Road'' was "rightly praised" at the time of its release by ''

Kinematograph Weekly ''Kinematograph Weekly'', popularly known as ''Kine Weekly'', was a trade paper catering to the British film industry between 1889 and 1971. History ''Kinematograph Weekly'' was founded in 1889 as the monthly publication ''Optical Magic Lantern ...

'' as "provocative and purposeful entertainment", and they add that it is "characterised by a real feeling for cramped working-class life and for the gap left when suddenly one is no longer required to be anywhere on a regular basis".

References

Bibliography

* Chibnall, Steve & McFarlane, Brian. ''The British 'B' Film''. Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

External links

* 1954 films British drama films 1954 drama films Films directed by Wolf Rilla Films shot at Beaconsfield Studios 1950s English-language films British black-and-white films 1950s British films {{1950s-UK-film-stub