It has to be said that, with few exceptions, British Lion managed to
exist in the 1930s due to concentrating almost entirely on inexpensive
'Quota Quickies' and rental of low-quality American imports. However,
that it managed to survive at all in that cutthroat, highly-competitive,
financially-unstable decade was proof of its tenacity. In 1936, probably
the studio's most prolific year, British Lion joined Hammer
productions, headed by businessman William Hinds, to co-produce two
films starring Paul Robeson. These were Song
of Freedom (1936), also starring Elisabeth Welch; and Big Fella
(1936). During the same period, Sandy Powell, the Yorkshire music hall
comic, appeared in Tom Arnold's It's a Grand Old World (1937); and Margaret
Lockwood was cast with Nora Swinburne in Jury's Evidence (1936).
By mid-1937, British Lion, still headed by Sam Smith, is again in financial
difficulties, and tiles ceased production until the middle of 1938.
From then on, Herbert Wilcox hired
the studio to make three minor productions, one of which was the Edgar
Wallace vehicle Return of the Frog (1938). Tom Arnold made another Sandy
Powell film; and George King, under
his Pennant banner, filmed melodramas including a remake of The Chinese
Bungalow (1940), with Jane Baxter. After the outbreak of the Second
World War, Beaconsfield Studios were requisitioned by the Ministry of
Works for Rotax Limited who manufactured magnetos for aircraft engines.
Although Beaconsfield Studios were still leased to the Ministry of Works
after the war, in 1947 the British Lion Group sold the studios to Alexander
Korda's London Films on the death of' Sam Smith. Korda retained
the company but sold the freehold of the studios to King's College Cambridge.
The Crown Film Unit, with many of the staff from the GPO Blackheath
Unit moved in.
The Government then spent a massive amount refurbishing and equipping
the studios for the Crown Film unit, which produced 75 films a year
for the Central Office of Information until it was disbanded during
1951-52. Shortly afterwards, Michael
Balcon became chairman of Group3, a subsidiary of the National Film
Finance Corporation, with a brief to develop new talent and act as a
stepping stone for young filmmakers. Balcon appointed John
Grierson as managing director. The intention was to make story documentaries
which blended documentary and fiction on small budgets. Unfortunately
Grierson had no experience of the discipline of turning ideas into lively
and coherent feature scripts. By the mid-1950s, The National Film Finance
Corporation had decided that their studio base was unjustifiable and
Group3's type of middle-budget production was not suited to current
exhibition patterns. Having lost nearly half a million pounds, the NFFC
sold the group off to become Beaconsfield Films Ltd.
In 1956, producer Peter Rogers moved into Beaconsfield and produced
films including the taut thrillers Time
Lock (1957) and Vicious
Circle (1957), until he moved his operations to Pinewood where he
founded the Carry On series.
Independent Artists were the final production company at Beaconsfield,
they produced films including Blind Date (1958), Tiger
Bay (1959), Battle
of the Sexes (1959), Never Let Go (1960), The
Bulldog Breed (1960), Very
Important Person (1961), Crooks
Anonymous (1962), The
Fast Lady (1962), Father Came Too (1963), This
Sporting Life (1963), The
Wrong Arm of the Law (1963), the final feature film based at the
studios was Press
For Time (1966). The studios then became a warehouse for the North
Thames Gas Board until 1971, when The National Film School purchased
the freehold. In 1983, it became The National Film and Television School,
funded by a partnership of government and industry, offering full-tine
professional training leading to a NFTS Associateship in the field of
directors, producers, editors, cinematographers and other personnel
producer. NFTS graduates include directors Terence Davies, Beeban Kidron,
Lynne Ramsay and Mark Herman.
