Back-Room Boy

Back-Room Boy
DVD cover
Directed by	Herbert Mason
Produced by	Edward Black
Written by	Marriott Edgar Val Guest John Orton
Starring	Arthur Askey Moore Marriott Graham Moffatt
Music by	Hans May
Cinematography	Jack E. Cox
Edited by	R.E. Dearing
Production company	Gainsborough Pictures
Distributed by	General Film Distributors
Release dates	17 April 1942 (1942-04-17) (United Kingdom) 10 February 1947 (1947-02-10) (Sweden)
Running time	82 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English German

Back-Room Boy is a 1942 British comedy film directed by Herbert Mason and starring Arthur Askey, Googie Withers, Graham Moffatt and Moore Marriott. A man from the Met Office is sent to a lighthouse on a remote Scottish island to monitor the weather. He hopes to escape from women, but soon finds the island overrun by them.

Plot

Arthur Askey plays meteorologist Arthur Pilbeam who is jilted by his fiancée Betty because he has to speed back to the BBC every hour, on the hour due to his internationally vital job of creating the BBC pips. As he cannot be fired during wartime and wanting to avoid all women, he is assigned the solitary job of sending weather reports from a remote Scottish lighthouse. Before taking a boat from the mainland during the four hours of daylight that are available for the time of year, the locals warn him he will go mad from isolation and the curse of a mermaid within a month as others have.

Authur Pilbeam soon has his peace shattered as a stowaway is found in the lighthouse and the survivors of a torpedoed ship arrive. Things are crowded on the lighthouse until one-by-one people start to mysteriously disappear, leaving an anxious Pilbeam to discover what has been happening to everyone and why.

Cast

• Arthur Askey - Arthur Pilbeam
• Moore Marriott - Jerry
• Graham Moffatt - Albert
• Googie Withers - Bobbie
• Vera Frances - Jane
• Joyce Howard - Betty
• John Salew - Steve Mason
• George Merritt - Uncle
• Aubrey Mallalieu (uncredited) - West
• D. J. Williams (uncredited)- McIntyre

Production

Arthur Askey replaced Will Hay when Hay moved from Gainsborough to Ealing Studios before the Second World War. Filming took place at Gaunt-British Studios, Lime Grove Studios and Shepherds Bush, London, England.

Reception

In his book about 1940s British cinema, Realism and Tinsel, Robert Murphy describes the film as "the funniest if the least original of the Askey comedies". Halliwell's Film Video & DVD Guide describes the film as a "[fairly] spirited star comedy of interest as a shameless rip-off of The Ghost train and Oh Mr Porter!."

Home media

Back-Room Boy was released on DVD on February 19, 2007. The film was also released in the Arthur Askey Collection box set on DVD in 2007 in the United Kingdom followed by another edition in 2012.

Bibliography

• Murphy, Robert. (1989). Realism and Tinsel: Cinema and Society in Britain, 1939-1949. Routledge
• Walker, John. (ed). (2004). Halliwell's Film Video & DVD Guide 2004. HarperCollins Entertainment. 19th edition
• Mayer, Geoff. (2003). Guide to British Cinema. Greenwood Publishing Group

External links

• Back-Room Boy at IMDb
• Back-Room Boy is available for free download at the Internet Archive
• Back-Room Boy at the British Film Institute's Film and TV Database