Steve Clarke and Janet Hall like David Lean's 1945 classic romance "Brief Encounter." Really like it. In fact, they like it so much that they are filming their own tribute to it, using the original locations wherever possible.
A few days ago, Clarke posted a tease for the project on YouTube. It's do-it-yourself all the way — and utterly charming:
Clarke describes the clip:
WELCOME TO OUR BRIEF ENCOUNTER FILM CLIPS.WE HAVE BEEN RE-ENACTING SCENES FROM THE FILM FOR THE PAST THREE YEARS. WE ARE MAKING OUR OWN FILM VERSION CALLED A PERSONAL TRIBUTE TO BRIEF ENCOUNTER. MANY OF THE SCENES IN THESE CLIPS WERE SHOT IN THE ORIGINAL LOCATIONS THAT DAVID LEAN USED IN 1945. AS JANET AND I ARE NOT ACTORS IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM, IT HAS BEEN A DAUNTING TASK TRYING TO RECREATE THE SCENES AS NEAR AS WE COULD TO THE ORIGINAL FILM. WE HAVE NOT THE CLIPPED VOICES THAT THEY HAD IN THOSE DAYS, BUT WE HAVE DONE THE BEST WE CAN WITH OUR NORTHERN ACCENTS. WE HOPE YOU ENJOY OUR EFFORTS ON THE RE-ENACTMENT OF THIS FAMOUS BRITISH FILM CLASSIC.
Those Northern accents come to the fore in this just-released clip interspersing footage from the original film with Clarke and Hall's new footage — "The Grit in the Eye Scene":
Hundreds of photos and other background information are on Clarke and Hall's "Our Brief Encounter." One of the pages should be of interest to G.K. Chesterton fans, as it includes before-and-after, 1945/2002 photos of the main street of the writer's adopted hometown, Beaconsfield. One wonders what Chesterton would have thought of the Noel Coward-penned "Brief Encounter" script.
