Fair Game is a funny, touching, picturesque film from the BBC and veteran television director Alan Dossor about three young people and their physical and personal journeys.
The time is 1970, a summer when the sun shone consistently on a Britain dividing its attention between a general election and the World Cup.
Ellie (Lena Heady, the future Cersei Lannister from Game of Thrones) and Carl (Julian Kerridge) are about to set off on a walking holiday across the Pennines from Preston in Lancashire to Whitby on the Yorkshire coast – and Ellie has gone on the pill especially.
Meanwhile, in Florence, suave and wealthy young Italian Marco (Massimo Bellinzoni) has just discovered that the couple he believed to be his parents are in fact his aunt and uncle and that his dad was a POW in England during World War II.
He leaves Italy for England with the only clue he has to his true identity – a postcard from Preston – and an impressive red Lamborghini.
When Ellie bumps into Marco in Preston library she decided to help him on his quest to find his parents. Along the way, Carl and Marco discover a shared passion for football and – problematically – for Ellie, and the film follows this unlikely trio through the trials of love, lust and loss as they undertake their epic journey across the Pennines.
Ellie finds herself torn between Carl the politico and Marco the Italiano – ultimately deciding to ditch both of her suitors in favour of pursuing a career as a fashion designer, a decision aided by a free-spirited ageing hippie traveller and photographer called Marjorie (Prunella Scales).
The film is full of wonderful period flavour and is so faithful to the time in which it is set that at times it is possible to believe it had actually been made in June 1970.
The soundtrack is superb, featuring The Beatles (Here Comes The Sun, Oh! Darling, Something, I Want You (She’s So Heavy), Sun King), Mungo Jerry (In The Summertime), Thunderclap Newman (Something in the Air), Canned Heat(On The Road Again, Let’s WorkTogether), Joe Cocker (With a Little Help from My Friends), The Kinks (Days) and Love Affair(OneRoad).
Fair Game aired on Saturday 11 June 1994 at 9.00 pm on BBC1.
Ellie
Lena Headey Carl
Julian Kerridge Marco
Massimo Bellinzoni Elena
Simone Bendix Simon Robson
Marston Bloom Uncle Jack
Eamon Boland Monaco
Gavino Bondioli Carl’s mother
Polly Hemingway Carl’s father
David Ross Auntie Alice
Gabrielle Lloyd Giampaolo
Joseph Long Eileen
Maggie Ollerenshaw Marjorie
Prunella Scales Claudio
Venantino Venantini Maria
Anita Zagaria
Ellie (Lena Heady, the future Cersei Lannister from Game of Thrones) and Carl (Julian Kerridge) are about to set off on a walking holiday across the Pennines from Preston in Lancashire to Whitby on the Yorkshire coast – and Ellie has gone on the pill especially.
Ellie finds herself torn between Carl the politico and Marco the Italiano – ultimately deciding to ditch both of her suitors in favour of pursuing a career as a fashion designer, a decision aided by a free-spirited ageing hippie traveller and photographer called Marjorie (Prunella Scales).
