Laxdale Hall
Laxdale Hall is a 1953 British romantic comedy film directed by John Eldridge and starring Ronald Squire, Kathleen Ryan, Raymond Huntley and Sebastian Shaw, with Prunella Scales and Fulton Mackay in early roles. Released in the U.S. as Scotch on the Rocks, it was adapted from the 1951 novel Laxdale Hall by Eric Linklater. The story is one of the few to touch on the British Town Planning system – mocking the New Towns Act 1946. Plot The few car owners of Laxdale, a remote village near the Isle of Skye at Applecross, refuse to pay their Road Fund taxes, in protest against the poor state of the only road to the village. A series of summonses, sent out via the local police, mysteriously disappear. The government sends a delegation to investigate. It is led by Samuel Pettigrew, a pompous politician and industrialist, whose mother was born in Laxdale. He is accompanied by another MP, Hugh Marvell, and Andrew Flett from the Scottish Office. Pettigrew presents plans to abandon the village and set up a New Town, Brumley Dumps, 100 miles away. But the villagers are unimpressed. Flett, a former teacher, begins romancing the local schoolteacher. Marvell spends his time