The Breaking of Bumbo

This film has had a most curious history. It was intended that it should be directed by the team of Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo, who had attracted attention with their amateur-made film It Happened Here (1964), which got cinema showings and general acclaim in 1966. But they left the project shortly before filming was due to begin and Andrew Sinclair, who had written the script from his own novel, was abruptly promoted to director. The film was made in the early summer of 1970 and was the opening-night attraction at the "Cinema City" exhibition at London's Round House in October of that year. (This exhibition, financed by the "Sunday Times" newspaper, was a celebration of 75 years of cinema). The film was very poorly received at this time, and plans to give it a cinema release were abruptly canceled. It went unseen in Britain until an isolated TV showing on the BBC five years later. Then it vanished again.