A jolly little racing caper with cads, stiffs and bounders a plenty who are all out to make money one way or another. Henry Kendall is excellent as Archie Burton (reminds me of David Cameron) and his volatile relationship with his wife Cicely (Enid Stamp-Taylor) is both humorous and believable. Guy Middleton (who also appears in one of my favourite George Formby films "Keep Fit") is very smooth as Cicely's lover Richard Carfax but I found Claude Hulbert a bit too frenetic in his role as Alistair Pallivant. I thought the film production was excellent considering it was made in the 1930s and there are some nice little touches such as Pallivant writing different horse names on a generic tipster letter.

When I first watched this film I wasn't sure if there would be any racecourse scenes but was absolutely blown away to discover the outside action was filmed at Goodwood Racecourse during a live meeting. There are some amazing shots of the long home straight, the pulling-up area on Trundle Hill (since 1967 the horses have pulled up around a bend), the old parade ring next to the course (moved to the south side of the course behind the March stand in 1976) and the old stands. The racecourse name isn't mentioned during the film but there's no denying it's Goodwood. Several other films in my collection feature Goodwood but the coverage is nowhere near as good as this and it's just amazing to see my home course as it used to be some 80 years ago.  The one race scene at the end of the film shows action from a real six furlong event at the racecourse (24 runners) interspersed with close up shots of the main equine protagonist racing among a few other horses, but at least filmed on the same track. There is one small speeded up section but generally the whole thing works well and is a lot better than some other racing scenes shot 20 to 30 years later.

An absolute gem of a film and I'm so glad that this previously unreleased material was made available on DVD in 2013. I just love all the ingredients; the characters, the plot, the script, the old English dialogue and most of all the stunning views of Goodwood racecourse as it used to be, a must watch for any racing fan. (Rating 9/10)

Favourite Quotes:
Blinkers Grayson: "I’ve got an idea about that, I know a chap, just the chap to find out who’s been giving things away, a chap called Pallavant, Alistair Pallavant, Ever heard of him? Used to do a lot of betting, sort of a gent but broke to the wide, now he’s a sort of tipster, runs a sort of turf enquiry bureau, he’s pretty smart they say."
Archie Burton: "Never heard of him, what does he look like?"
Blinkers Grayson: "Oh a bit of an ass."