Arena: Cinema

A new British film has its Royal Premiere tomorrow. It is an English period film and vividly demonstrates the high production values, quality and talent available in this country but which so rarely get the chance to reach our screens. The Thirty-nine Steps was originally a novel by John Buchan and has already been filmed twice, by HITCHCOCK in 1935, starring ROBERT DONAT , and by RALPH THOMAS in 1960, starring KENNETH MORE. Gavin Millar looks at the tradition from which it sprang. Plus a foretaste of one of the most interesting London Film Festivals ever.