Regal Reminiscences

by Richard Carter at the Norris Museum

The Regal Cinema in the Broadway, St Ives played a very big part in my life. The building is still there and is now a night club called Element. In 1963 I saw my first film here on the 9th May. I was seven years old and the film was called the Queen’s Guard. I confirmed the date by going through the Hunts Post for that year. The Regal advertised films weekly and it was interesting to note, which films were being shown.

This gave me an idea, review the films that were being shown fifty years ago, starting with the Queen’s Guard and the second film I saw, Summer Holiday, but first a little context.

In 1963, we only had two black and white television channels to choose from and there were no video/DVD players. In order to see a film you had to go to the cinema and unlike today, films were regularly rereleased, giving cinema goers the chance to see a film they might have missed, or wanted to see again.

The impact of seeing a colour film on a seven year old, for the first time was huge. As a result I starting going to the children’s matinees, which were held every Saturday afternoon at 2.30pm, for the price of one shilling. As I got older I started going during the week and continued until I went to college ten years later.

In April this year (2013), I started working as a museum assistant at the Norris Museum. This started me thinking about the films I had seen at the Regal and from memory I drew up a list.

The Queen’s Guard was a Michael Powell film originally released in 1961. Powell made the notorious Peeping Tom, prior to this film, but it was released later. It was Peeping Tom that ended his career as a director in Britain. To a seven year old the Queen’s Guard was an exciting film. It did poorly at the box office and seems to have sunk without a trace. It was only shown on television once in the 1970s and was never released on video/DVD. The filmed starred real life father and son, Daniel and Raymond Massey, playing a father and son. Powell seems to have been given freedom to film the Trooping of the Colour parade in 1960 and the Guard’s Barracks and training area. The idea may have been to produce a recruitment film for the army.

Summer Holiday, with Cliff Richard was the third highest grossing British film of 1963. To my young eyes the idea of turning a double decker bus into a giant camper van, was brilliant. The film moved along at a lively pace and was full of songs and people I recognised from the television. Bachelor Boy was added after filming had been complete, because the distributors felt the film was too short. By then Melvyn Hayes had grown out his dyed blonde hair and had to wear a blonde wig!