The Magnet. Image shows left to right: Harper (Meredith Edwards), Johnny Brent (James Fox). Credit: Ealing Studios
The Magnet
- 1950 film
Ealing Studios comedy about a boy who deceitfully acquires a powerful magnet from a younger boy. Stars James Fox, Stephen Murray, Kay Walsh, Meredith Edwards, Gladys Henson and more.
Press clippings
The Magnet: Watch clip of the rarely-seen Ealing comedy
An 11-year-old James Fox - later, of course, to make his name in the likes of The Servant and Performance - was given his first starring role in this Ealing comedy set largely in Liverpool and the Wirral. Fox (still acting under his actual first name, William) plays a schoolboy who tricks another kid out of a fancy-looking magnet, and then becomes an inadvertent hero after it ends up in an iron lung. The restored version of The Magnet is out now on DVD.
The Guardian, 2nd July 2015