Love on a Branch Line (TV series)

infobox television
show_name = Love on a Branch Line


caption =
format = Drama / Comedy
runtime = 50 minutes per episode
starring = Michael Maloney
Leslie Phillips
Maria Aitken
Abigail Cruttenden
country = United Kingdom
network = BBC One
first_aired = June 12, 1994
num_episodes = 4
imdb_id = 0106058|

Love on a Branch Line was a British television adaptation of the 1959 novel Love on a Branch Line by John Hadfield. It was broadcast in 1994 airing on the BBC in four 50 minute episodes. [ [http://www.movietome.com/movie/316613/love-on-a-branch-line/index.html Love on a Branch Line Info, Trailers, and Reviews at MovieTome ] ]

Cast

ynopsis

Jasper Pye a refined civil servant is sent to rural Suffolk to close the Office of Output Statistics which has outdated its use. Instead he becomes seduced by the small idyllic world he finds there, making his task rather more difficult than he had imagined. He soon finds himself becoming entangled with the local aristocrats three beautiful daughters.

Plot

Jasper Pye is a polite, honest civil servant who lives with his mother. One night when he hears his girlfriend describe him as 'boring' at a party, he decides he needs an urgent, radical change in his life. The following morning he heads into the ministry, determined to resign his job and move to Paris to become a painter. Instead he is dissuaded by his superior, who instead wants him to go to Flamborough Hall in Suffolk where the Office of Output Statistics, a small government department has been working since 1940 when it was commandeered during the Battle of Britain and overlooked for closure for a number of years, despite its apparent lack of usefulness.

Initially reluctant to take the assignment the diffident Jasper is persuaded by his boss. He is told that his remit is essentially to close the place down, through he has an entirely "free hand" in the matter. Jasper prepares to leave for the small village of Arcady where Flamborough Hall is located. Symbolically he recovers his umbrella which he had shoved into a flowerbed in St James' Park when planning to abandon the civil service, thinking to himself. "Well, it was a rather good umbrella, and it might rain"

He catches a train to Arcady, but finds that the branch line that runs there from the neighbouring town had closed four years before. He instead has to walk into the village. He arrives to find Flamborough Hall a magnificent sight but seemingly far too large for the small department of three employees who work there despite the large budget being spent on it. He quickly finds himself the talk of the town, as the 'man from the ministry' who cuts quite a dash. In particular he strikes up a relationship with each of Lord Flamborough's daughters. Chloe, the eldest, trapped in an unhappy marriage with her drunken, wayward husband. Belinda the flirtatious and uninhibited middle daughter and the wildly romantic youngest Matilda.

When he goes to meet the eccentric Lord Flamborough who now lives on a steam train on a nearby private railway. Instead of rebuking Jasper for entangling himself with his daughters, he seems more interested in the fact that he can dance the Charleston. Like everyone else in the village, he seems to take to Jasper, helping to persuade him to stay for the fete that Bank Holiday Monday, being held in aid of fallen woman. He is to be the judge of a competition of ladies ankles. He has again disposed of his umbrella after being told he is very sexy apart from it.

He soon finds that the departments two senior employees spend most of their time running the hall, the village and the local cricket team. Anything in fact, other than the jobs they are supposed to be doing in the department. Jasper finds it very difficult to find any information out, because of their evasive responses, and his own extracurricular activities which draw him away from his task. On one of the rare moments he actually manages to have a discussion on the work of the department with the third employee Miss Mounsey she breaks down and admits to him that she has been completely making up the statistics for a number of years, worrying this may have affected government policy. Jasper reassures her that "nobody has ever taken the least bit of notice in the work of your department" much to her relief.

Jasper has become a regular fixture in the life of the village, despite having only been there for a few days. He undertakes a number of adventures such finds himself locked in a wine cellar, scoring the winning runs in a cricket match and becoming an overnight expert on gardening. All the while he faces the difficult decision of whether to close the obviously redundant department despite the rural idyll it seems to support. Eventually he announces that the department is to close, a decision which does not go down well with the villagers, although they apparently bear Jasper no ill will because of it. The fete proceeds as planned, including a traction engine rally and a demonstration of the Charleston by Jasper.

Miss Tidy, a lady who shared the railway carriage with Jasper on his way up to Arcady, and a former paramour of Lord Flanborough, announces that she has in fact being there acting on behalf of the National Trust who want to preserve the house for the nation, meaning that life can go on as it was before in Arcady.

Jasper meanwhile has come to realise that in spite of the attentions shown him by the three daughters, the woman he is most taken with is the shy Miss Mounsey, the secretary for the department. When it starts to rain, embracing his true personae by retrieving the umbrella from the flowerbed. The story ends with Jasper and Miss Mounsey embracing on the platform at Arcady station.

Production

Much of the outdoor scenes were filmed at Oxburgh Hall in Norfolk, while the railway scenes were filmed on the North Norfolk Railway, in particular using Weybourne station as a substitute for the fictional Arcady station.

Each episode is named after a 1920s song, from the Charleston era beloved by Lord Flanborough - "Yes Sir, That's My Baby", "I Wonder Where My Baby Is Tonight", "I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby" and "Ain't She Sweet".

Media Releases

Love on a Branch Line was released on Region One DVD in 2002 [ [http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00006BSDN Amazon.com: Love on a Branch Line: Michael Maloney, Leslie Phillips, Maria Aitken, Graham Crowden, Stephen Moore, Amanda Root, David Haig, Cathryn Harrison, Abigail Cruttenden, Charlotte Williams, Gillian Raine, Joe Melia, Maggie Wells, Jennifer Pier... ] ] and on Region Two in 2006. [ [http://www.choicesuk.com/Product.aspx/!681824 Love On A Branch Line - DVD - ChoicesUK.com ] ] [ [http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/924477/Love-On-A-Branch-Line/Product.html Play.com (UK) : Love On A Branch Line (2 Discs) (BBC) : DVD - Free Delivery ] ]

References