Metadata
WORK ID: NEFA 21929 (Master Record)
Title | Year | Date |
THE GUN - A STORY BASED ON FACT | 1963 | 1963-01-01 |
Details
Original Format: Standard 8 Colour: Black & White Sound: Silent Duration: 10 mins 25 secs Credits: Organisations: Caldercote Junior School Individuals: David Williams Genre: Student Film Subject: EDUCATION FAMILY LIFE MILITARY / POLICE |
Summary A short amateur film of mistaken identity produced by pupils of Caldercote Junior School in Leicester. The film tells the story of a schoolboy who believes he sees a man loading a gun in a car beside the school. He tells his teacher who doesn’t believe him. The following day the teacher, after seeing newspaper headlines of a gunman on the loose, sp ... |
Description
A short amateur film of mistaken identity produced by pupils of Caldercote Junior School in Leicester. The film tells the story of a schoolboy who believes he sees a man loading a gun in a car beside the school. He tells his teacher who doesn’t believe him. The following day the teacher, after seeing newspaper headlines of a gunman on the loose, speaks with the police offering them the car registration written down by the boy the previous day. Going to the house where the car is registered,...
A short amateur film of mistaken identity produced by pupils of Caldercote Junior School in Leicester. The film tells the story of a schoolboy who believes he sees a man loading a gun in a car beside the school. He tells his teacher who doesn’t believe him. The following day the teacher, after seeing newspaper headlines of a gunman on the loose, speaks with the police offering them the car registration written down by the boy the previous day. Going to the house where the car is registered, the police expect to find the gunman, but instead discover that the gun seen by the pupil is in fact a toy belonging to a small child. The film ends with the pupil receiving a letter of thanks from Leicester City Police. The teacher in the films is believed to be David Williams who assisted with this production. The film also features David’s son Simon as the small boy playing with the toy gun.
Title: Caldercote Junior School Presents
Title: The Gun – A Story Based on Fact
The film opens on a school playing field and a group of boys playing a game of cricket with a teacher. A ball is bowled by one of the boys and is watched by two others as the ball flies high into the sky.
Believed to have landed in bushes near to the school fence one of the boy rushes over to collect it. Seeing the ball has actually landed beside a Ford Popular car parked in the street, the boy climbs over the fence to collect it. As he is about to jump down from the fence he sees a pair of hands belonging to a man inside the car appearing to load bullets into a revolver.
The boy jumps down, picks up the ball and climbs back over the fence. On his way back over he turns and memorises the car’s registration, JBD 260.
Back on the school field he rushes over to the teacher and tells him what he has seen. The boy runs back to the fence in time to see the car drive away. He walks back despondently before taking out a pen from his pocket where he writes the car registration on a scrap of paper.
Title: Next morning…
The teacher from the previous day walks along a suburban street and goes inside S&N Sharpes newsagents to buy a newspaper. The headline on the pavement sign reads ‘Gunman Attacks Local Shop’. The teacher comes out of the shop reading the headline of the Leicester Mercury which reads ‘Shop Assistant Attacked by Gunman – Robbed of £50’.
The teacher walks quickly across the road and the film cuts to him walking though the school gates and along the driveway past a student. He speaks with a boy resting against a wall who points him towards the boy from the previous day playing marbles with his friends on the school playground. The teacher calls the boy over and shows him the newspaper headline. The boy points.
Title: “I wrote the number down… somewhere…”
From his pockets, the boy pulls various pieces of crumpled papers that he places onto the open newspaper held by the teacher. Putting the newspaper on the ground, they work look through the scraps searching for the car registration without any luck. As they stand, another scrap falls from the boy’s pocket. The teacher picks it up and sees the car registration written there.
They both go into the school and the teacher makes a phone call. The film cuts to a policeman sitting at his desk taking the call and writing details down on a piece of paper. The phone call ends and the officer begins to look through a draw of cards in a cabinet next to his desk.
A sign that includes the coat of arms of Leicester attached to a wall reads ‘City Police Headquarters’. Out of the entranceway comes a police car, possibly a Renault 8, that turns left into the street and left again along another road. General views show the car driving along a road and pulling up outside a modern semi-detached house. Two men get out, approach the front door and knock.
A woman appears at the door and looks shocked as the two men talk to her.
Title: “May we see your husband’s gun licence?”
The woman shakes her head
Title: “Is there a gun in the house?”
The woman replies positively and escorts the men inside. She enters the living room.
Title: “This is the only one…”
She looks down on the floor where a small boy sits beside a fire pointing a toy gun towards the policemen. One of the officers looks shocked, but realising it is a toy gun begin to laugh, the woman smiles. On the table is a cardboard box for the toy gun and a number of birthday cards along the mantelpiece.
The two police officers leave the house, get back into their car and drive away.
Title: A few days later…
The film returns to the school and the boy standing outside the classroom. He comes in and hands a letter to the teacher. The letter is addressed to D.R. Williams of Caldercote Junior School and is from Leicester City Police dated 3rd July 1963. He opens the letter and after reading its content calls the boy over and shows him it. The letter thanks the boy for all his help. The film ends with the teacher patting the boy on the back.
End Title: The end
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