Tawny Pipit (film)
| Tawny Pipit | |
|---|---|
.jpg)
|
|
| Directed by | |
| Produced by | Bernard Miles William Sistrom |
| Written by | |
| Starring | |
| Music by | Noel Mewton-Wood |
| Cinematography |
Eric Cross Ray Sturgess |
| Edited by | Douglas Myers |
|
Production
company |
Two Cities Films (as a Prestige Production)
|
| Distributed by | General Film Distributors |
|
Release date
|
|
|
Running time
|
81 min. |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
Tawny Pipit is a British war film produced by Prestige Productions in 1944. It tells of how the residents of a small English village collaborate when the nest of a pair of rare tawny pipits is discovered there.
During the Second World War Jimmy Bancroft (Niall MacGinnis), a fighter pilot just released from hospital, and his nurse (now his girlfriend) Hazel Broome (Rosamund John) are on a walking tour through the countryside. They arrive at the fictional village of Lipsbury Lea and, being keen birdwatchers, discover that a pair of tawny pipits, which are rarely seen in England, are nesting nearby.
Staying in the village, they enlist the locals to protect the nesting site until the eggs hatch. The villagers do so with great enthusiasm, led by the fiery retired Colonel Barton-Barrington (Bernard Miles) and the Reverend Mr. Kingsley.
Unfortunately, the field where the nest is located (known locally as the pinfold) is due to be ploughed up by order of the county's War Agricultural Executive Committee (the "War Ag"), and a delegation to the Ministry of Agriculture in London fails to get the order rescinded. Fortunately, the Minister was Barton-Barrington's "fag" at his public school, Marlborough, and personally intervenes to save the field from being ploughed.
The eggs duly hatch, but not before a plot to steal them on behalf of an unscrupulous dealer is foiled by an alert army corporal (a professional ornithologist) who is serving nearby.
James Fisher and Julian Huxley were credited as ornithological advisers for the film. Nevertheless, Eric Hosking's footage of the pipits was actually of meadow pipits because he could not get genuine tawny pipits from German-occupied Europe.
...
Wikipedia