The Scene from Melbury House

British Transport Films record the varied daily lives of their neighbours as seen from the high roof of their building in London’s Marylebone.

As a training exercise for their apprentice camera operators, British Transport Films used surplus ‘roll end’ lengths of film to record the varied daily lives of their neighbours as seen from the high roof of their building in London’s Marylebone. The material was then composed into a shape not inappropriate to its musical accompaniment, drawn from the London Symphony of Ralph Vaughan Williams – who was also a neighbour and a friend of the unit. This is a very rare outing for this title, as very few prints were ever made.