| The Love Match | |
| Director: | David Paltenghi |
| Producer: | Maclean Rogers |
| Based On: | play The Love Match by Glenn Melvyn |
| Starring: | Arthur Askey |
| Music: | Wilfred Burns |
| Cinematography: | Arthur Grant |
| Editing: | Joseph Sterling |
| Studio: | Beaconsfield Productions Group 3 |
| Distributor: | British Lion Films |
| Runtime: | 85 minutes |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Language: | English |
| Gross: | £174,991 (UK) [1] |
The Love Match is a 1955 British black and white comedy film directed by David Paltenghi and starring Arthur Askey, Glenn Melvyn, Thora Hird and Shirley Eaton.[2] A football-mad railway engine driver and his fireman are desperate to get back in time to see a match. It was based on the 1953 play of the same name by Glenn Melvyn, one of the stars of the film.[3] A TV spin-off series, Love and Kisses, appeared later in 1955.[4]
According to the National Film Finance Corporation, the film made a comfortable profit.[5] [6] According to Kinematograph Weekly it was a "money maker" at the British box office in 1955.[7]
In British Sound Films: The Studio Years 1928–1959 David Quinlan rated the film as "good", writing: "Good, noisy north country comedy. Old jokes notch remarkably high scoring rate."[8]
The Radio Times Guide to Films gave the film 3/5 stars, writing: "Although this is an admirable enough comedy, it is also one of those unforgivably patronising pictures that bourgeois British film makers believed presented an authentic picture of working-class life. Arthur Askey stars as a football crazy railway employee whose passion for a team of no-hopers lands him in all sorts of trouble. Struggling against a shortage of genuinely funny situations, the cast does well to keep the action alive. The highlight is Askey's heckling of the referee, a wonderful moment of football hooliganism."[9]
TV Guide noted a "highly enjoyable farce."[10]
Britmovie called it a "boisterous Lancashire comedy with a rapid succession of old jokes."[11]