Saturday Rave: Genevieve by William Rose.

If there is a perfect film to lift the spirit while simultaneously teaching us a little about very old cars and a great deal about human nature, then it's Genevieve.

Genevieve, unlike the stars of most films, is permanently on display. She can be seen here:



For Genevieve is a car - a special car - a 1904 Darracq, to be precise, and her tale was told by the screenwriter William Rose.

Genevieve's driver Alan McKim ends up in a very unofficial race with his great friend Ambrose Claverhouse, the driver of a 1905 Spyker, during the London to Brighton rally.

The men squabble like schoolboys, and like schoolboys they get into one scrape after another, despite the protests of Alan's wife Wendy and Ambrose's girlfirend Rosalind. At last, utterly exasperated, Wendy lets fly with this immortal line:

This is the end! Making a public spectacle of  yourselves. I couldn't have believed you could have behaved like this, either of you. Just hauling like brooligans.

And, do you know, that makes them all laugh so much that they actually stop.

For a minute, anyway: soon the mayhem returns.

Here, to give you a flavour of the film, are John Gregson and Dinah Sheridan as Alan and Wendy McKim.

 

Word To Use Today: hooligan. Hooligans may well be named after the Houlihan family, who were presumably a loud and rather rough lot. The word first appeared in the 1800s.