The Lady Vanishes

I watched the BBC's adaptation of The Lady Vanishes last night. It struck me as a bit "am dram" and – like the train – started off very slowly before speeding up at the end.

The original Hitchcock film made in 1938 is very creaky now but the 1979 remake with Cybill Shepherd as the heroine, Ellliot Gould as the Spanish civil war photographer she meets, Angela Lansbury as Miss Froy and Arthur Lowe and Ian Carmichael as the sterotypically English cricket fans on their way to a Test match at Old Trafford is still watchable.

For some reason, The Wheel Spins, the book on which it's based, and its author Ethel White are both pretty much forgotten now.