Episode 29: South London sport films

A film special. We explore the subbest of sub-genres - South London sport movies.

Norman Beaton leads a group of Brixton cricketers to the countryside to play a match that’s friendly in name only in 1987’s Playing Away. A post-Lord of the Rings Orlando Bloom is a milkman turned prize fighter in mockumentary The Calcium Kid. New Cross Stadium is immortalised in the Dirk Bogarde speedway vehicle Once a Jolly Swagman. Wildcard Peter Colt is a washed up British tennis player vying for an unlikely romance with a young American beauty and one last shot at glory in Wimbledon.
We also visit the Oval for The Final Test and talk about Woody Allen's Match Point.

Our theme music is an excerpt from X2 by the Harlow Family Group and is used with kind permission.