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• The Wild One and the BBFC (2017, tbc mins): ex-BBFC examiner Robert Falcon discusses the films' history with the British censor.

Anyone researching this subject will find it very useful to consult Leslie Halliwell's autobiography Seats in All Parts (pp.301-4) in which he relates in detail how the Cambridge cinema he managed in 1954 overturned the BBFC ban and became the only English cinema - there was also one in Wales - to screen The Wild One at that time, with the approval of the local watch committee.

This may be surprising given Halliwell's dislike of Brando and motorcycles, described in his Filmgoer's Companion as "hideous and unbearably noisy machines". But then, like most successful business people (he was later film buyer for ITV and Channel 4), he rarely allowed his personal prejudices to interfere with his shrewd commercial judgement!

Thanks, Jonathan!

To accompany Jonathan S's comments, here's Leslie Halliwell's introduction to Channel 4's screening of the film back in 1983