THE BELSTONE FOX. (1973) BASED ON THE NOVEL 'THE BALLAD OF THE BELSTONE FOX.' WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY JAMES HILL. STARRING RACHEL ROBERTS, ERIC PORTER, JEREMY KEMP, BILL TRAVERS, DENNIS WATERMAN, HEATHER WRIGHT AND A FIRST-CLASS CAST OF DOGS AND FOXES.
REVIEW BY SANDRA HARRIS. ©
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Available on Blu-ray & DVD - 28th August 2017
This is a heartbreakingly beautiful film, but I'm not altogether too sure about its PG rating. There's quite a lot of peril in it, peril which may not be too suitable for some young kids. Unless you particularly want 'em to learn harsh life lessons about the cruelty of Mother Nature and the cycle of life and death in the countryside, haha.
In the first scene alone, a Mammy fox and her cubs are battered to death in cold blood by person or persons unknown. It's worse than Bambi's mother being shot. At least that happens off-screen...! I wasn't too happy about the violence against the foxes but then, aren't foxes a kind of much maligned little creature to begin with? There's always people going on about how the population of foxes (or rabbits or badgers, come to that) needs to be kept down for some reason.
Foxes always seem to get a bad press, don't they, which is sad, considering how sweet and adorable they are. I just know now that some reader who's familiar with the countryside is going to message me and tell me exactly why foxes are harmful to the environment. Okay, feel free, I've always encouraged keeping the lines of communication open, but don't expect me to stop thinking that they're cute...!
I met a fox once, here in the inner city, believe it or not. I was coming home in the early hours of the morning after an open mic night and I saw a fox crossing the empty dark street near my house, on his way to poke about in some bins outside a local restaurant. Obviously some free grub there for the taking, haha. Or should I say for the foraging?
Anyway, there was one perfect moment where we were just standing, frozen, the pair of us, just looking at each other. Then Foxy seemed to shrug as if to say that my threat level was low-to-non-existent and so he needn't be bothered about me, and he went on his way. I never saw him again, but I'll never forget that moment.
If you can stand the peril, anyway, THE BELSTONE FOX is a gorgeously-shot British movie featuring some truly stunning scenes of the countryside and delightfully cute baby animals for viewers to oooh and aaah over. There's a rather sterling cast involved as well, with recognisable actors like Rachel Roberts and Dennis Waterman (MINDER, Hammer's SCARS OF DRACULA) playing supporting roles.
Two years after THE BELSTONE FOX, in fact, Rachel Roberts went on to play a major role in one of the spookiest films ever made, PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK. Remember, a bunch of Australian schoolgirls travel to the titular Rock for the titular picnic on Valentines' Day in 1900, and a sizeable handful of the girls, along with one teacher, never return and no-one has a clue what's become of them?
Very eerie stuff indeed. My best friend once asked me not to put up a movie poster of the film in my house because it freaks her out too much. Naturally, I still put it up because I'm mean like that, haha. Rachel Roberts is superb in it as the imposing alcoholic headmistress whose exclusive girls' boarding school goes down the tubes as a result of the mysterious disappearances.
She's marvellous in THE BELSTONE FOX too as Cathie, the wife of Asher. Asher is the huntsman for Mr. Kendrick, the lord of the local manor and (I think!) the Master of the local hunt. I haven't the first clue about hunting (I disapprove of it, by the way, I'm a real Lisa Simpson in that respect!) so I find the terminology a tad confusing.
Anyway, Asher the huntsman is the one who finds the titular little baby fox alone in the woods, after the cub's Mammy was bludgeoned to death by the gurriers we mentioned at the start of the review. Those lowlife gurriers...! That's a lovely Irish-ism to denote- ahem- scumbags, by the way.
Asher can't leave the poor little fellow to die alone amongst the trees, so he brings him home. It's his wife Cathie's idea to put the cub in with the bitch (lady dog, excuse the unflattering terminology!) called Old Ruin who had just whelped (given birth) the week before.
The baby fox gets on grand with the old dog and her puppies. In fact, the fox, named Tag by Asher and his family, forms a seemingly unbreakable bond with Merlin, one of Old Ruin's puppies. They're so adorably cute together as babies,
Merlin is being reared to take his place in the hunt with the other dogs in the pack, but while he's still a baby he can romp and roam with little Tag to his doggy heart's content. It's when Merlin's old enough to go out with the hunt chasing foxes and Tag's of an age to be released into the local countryside that the terrible, gut-wrenching heart-scalding problems begin for Asher and his family. Foxes and hunting dogs are natural enemies, after all...
Eric Porter is brilliant as Asher, the huntsman with the gruff exterior but with a heart underneath as mushy and squishy-soft as a marshmallow. I loved Heather Wright as his bubbly, pert-bosomed daughter Jenny too, and would have liked to have seen the storyline about her becoming 'anti-hunting' developed a bit more. She and Dennis Waterman as Stephen, Asher's whipper-in, would have made a lovely couple. I find the young Dennis Waterman quite sexy, by the way, just sayin'...!
Bill Travers as Tod is just superb. Tod, the old countryman who befriends and develops a close relationship with Tag when Tag is set free, is dressed like one of the traditional old British tramps in an Enid Blyton book and has an exhaustive knowledge of nature and animals.
Believe it or not, Bill Travers is the guy who plays the proper posh Englishman in BORN FREE (1966) who's married to Joy Adamson. Joy, of course, adopts the baby lion cub Elsa and forms a close relationship with her before having to release her into the wild. Much against her will, I might add, as they've each formed such a strong bond with the animal.
You'll notice two things here. One, Bill Travers must be well used to playing important roles in animal movies and two, the transformation from the neatly-shaved toff George Adamson to the scruffy but kindly Tod is really quite incredible. He's a terrific old countryside character. Not sure if they make 'em like that anymore, to be honest with you.
Jennie's birthday party is great craic anyway. I'm thinking of having one of those hoolies myself next time I'm in the mood for a good auld shindig. And, if I happen to end up prostrate in the barn with a drunken horny Dennis Waterman, well, so much the better...
THE BELSTONE FOX will be available to buy on Blu-Ray and DVD from NETWORK DISTRIBUTING on 28th August 2017. NETWORK DISTRIBUTING is home of The British Film Collection, the ultimate destination for vintage British films. This release is in conjunction with BLUE DOLPHIN PR & MARKETING.
Network is home of "The British Film" collection;
the ultimate destination for vintage British films.
#TheBritishFilm
Available on Blu-ray & DVD - 28th August 2017
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY OF SANDRA HARRIS.
Sandra Harris is a Dublin-based novelist, film blogger and movie reviewer. She has studied Creative Writing and Film-Making. She has published a number of e-books on the following topics: horror film reviews, multi-genre film reviews, womens' fiction, erotic fiction, erotic horror fiction and erotic poetry. Several new books are currently in the pipeline. You can browse or buy any of Sandra's books by following the link below straight to her Amazon Author Page:
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B015GDE5RO
You can contact Sandra at:
http://sandrafirstruleoffilmclubharris.wordpress.com
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