Nobody Ordered Love

BFI Most Wanted: the hunt for Britain's missing films

Directed by Robert Hartford-Davis, 1971

British exploitation cinema veteran Hartford-Davis attempts to lift the lid on the world of low-budget film-making in 70s Britain.

Production of 'The Somme', the film within the film

Credits

Director Production Companies Producer Screenplay Photography	Robert Hartford-Davis World Arts Media Group, R.H.D., Daylight Robert Hartford-Davis Robert Shearer Desmond Dickinson
Cast: Ingrid Pitt (Alice Allison), Judy Huxtable (Caroline Johnson), John Ronane (Paul Medbury), Tony Selby (Peter Triman), Peter Arne (Leo Richardstone), Mark Eden (Charles), David Weston (Jacques le Grand), John Glyn-Jones (Harry)
87 mins, 7,830 feet, sound, colour.

Why are we so keen to find it?

Robert Hartford-Davis was one of the most prolific directors in British cinema of the 60s and 70s and dabbled in many genres - horror (The Black Torment, 1964; Corruption, 1967; The Fiend, 1971), sexploitation (The Yellow Teddybears, 1963), a sci-fi musical (Gonks Go Beat, 1965), even 'blaxploitation' (Black Gunn, 1972). So the prospect of this hard-working veteran attempting an exposé of the workings of the lower echelons of British cinema in the early 70s is a fascinating one. Marjorie Bilbow's review in CinemaTV Today - "this film spins wildly through comedy, tragedy, satire, exposé, nudie, sex, violence and horror" - certainly suggests that Hartford-Davis was trying to cover all the familiar exploitation bases.

The cast is appealing too - Ingrid Pitt was at the peak of her popularity thanks to appearances in Hammer films like The Vampire Lovers (1970) and Countess Dracula (1970) while Judy Huxtable was another horror regular, whose next and final film would be opposite second husband Peter Cook in Derek and Clive Get the Horn (1979).

What's it about?

Director Paul Medbury has ambitious plans for his new First World War epic The Somme, but production is being disrupted by the behaviour of his star, former sex symbol Alice Allison. Medbury demands that the part be recast but his financier Leo Richardstone insists on a star name for the film, even if it's a star as dim as Alice's. Undeterred, Medbury auditions up-and-coming starlet Caroline Johnson, aware that she's likely going to have to sleep with the lecherous Richardstone if she's to secure the role. Meanwhile, Medbury's business partner Peter Triman tries to use Alice's alcoholism to get her fired from the production, cruelly seducing her, plying her with whiskey then dumping her. The plan backfires when Alice is found dead the next morning from a self-inflicted stab wound. Production goes ahead nonetheless; despite Caroline's deepening depression and disenchantment. At the preview, Medbury tells Triman that his behaviour has infringed a morality clause in his contract and that he won't be able to join Medbury in his next production, also to be financed by Richardstone. In revenge, Triman arranges for the negative of The Somme to be destroyed in an 'accident'.

Last seen?

Rank released Nobody Ordered Love in 1972 and it certainly played the New Victoria in London, regular home to low-budget exploitation fare. Star Ingrid Pitt has suggested - in an interview with the Celluloid Slammer blog as well as in one of her on-going series of columns for the Den of Geek website that Hartford-Davis had a falling out with Rank over the lack of promotion they were giving the film and stormed off with the prints, decamping to the States, where he continued to work. After his death, Pitt claims, his widow arranged for his belongings to be disposed of and the cans of film were among those items thrown out.

Does anything survive?

If Ingrid Pitt is right about the fate of Nobody Ordered Love, then the film itself probably doesn't. However, BFI Stills, Posters and Designs holds a set of black and white stills.

Reviews

Writing in the Monthly Film Bulletin, David MacGillivray (who certainly knew more than most about the world of 70s British exploitation filmmaking) observed that Nobody Ordered Love "goes completely off the rails" and that "a few observations, no doubt culled from the writer or director's own experience, manage to be ludicrously accurate (the nude audition, the supporting player who considers himself God's gift to female extras) but the majority, bluntly over-stated, are simply ludicrous."

In Films and Filming, Julian Fox notes that the special effects are impressive but berates Hartford-Davis for his direction, suggesting that he "referees this mish-mash as if his life depended on it. It seems to have been shot in such a tearing hurry that every scene appears to be over almost before it has had time to develop." He does, however, concede that the film is "occasionally funny."

Kevin Lyons, Filmographic Unit, BFI National Library

Read about some of Maurice Elvey's surviving films, including video clips for users in UK schools, colleges, universities and public libraries, at BFI Screenonline.