Page 5 - Fujifilm Exposure_8 Wildlife John Downer_ok

phy and some Islington neighbours’ children who grew up to be Sally Gray and Jean Simmons, Francis had no connection with filmmaking until the day he first went on set as a stillsman’s apprentice.
But once he’d properly gradu- ated to the camera crew there was no looking back. From the mid-30s on he moved from BIP first to British & Dominion - “until the place burnt down” - starting a long
run on Paramount British Quota quickies, one every two weeks. Subsequent assignments took him on a dizzy tour of the various British studios, from The Rock to Amalgamated, from Pinewood on the day it opened to Twickenham where the day after he finished sooty-faced on Carol Reed’s coal- mining drama The Stars Look Down, World War Two was
declared.
During the war, Francis - who
progressed from clerk to corporal to Warrant Officer Class 1 - man- aged to find filmic jobs first organis- ing training films in the Ordnance Corps then as part of the fledgling Army Kinematograph Service some- times alongside the likes of Reed, Freddie Young and Thorold Dickinson. Forget fiction, some of
continued on page 6
Photos: main: Freddie Francis; from left: The American Civil War epic Glory (Courtesy Moviestore Collection); John Huston and Freddie Francis