Old Scores

Of course it didn’t happen - the last time Wales beat the All Blacks was in 1953 - but anything goes in fiction.

Old Scores, New Zealand/Wales, 1991

Director: Alan Clayton
Producer: Don Reynolds
Screenplay: Dean Parker, Greg McGee
Script Executive: Chris Hampson
Director of Photography: Allen Guilford
Editors: Jamie Selkirk, Mike Horton
Music composer: Wayne Warlow
Line Producer: Richard Meyrick

With: John Bach (Ewen Murray), Martyn Sanderson (Acid Aitken), Windsor Davies (Evan Price), Robert Pugh (Bleddyn Morgan), Alison Bruce (Ngaire Morgan), Beth Morris (Bronwen Llewellyn), John Francis (David Llewellyn), Stephen Tozer (Jim Farquhar)

And featuring the players as themselves: Ian Kirkpatrick, Waka Nathan, Grahame Thorne, Alex Wylie)

35mm, 93 minutes, PG-contains coarse language

Awards: 1991 Welsh Bafta, Best Drama; 1992 NZ Film Awards, Best Screenplay, Best Performance in a supporting role (John Bach), Best film score

“Of course it didn’t happen - the last time Wales beat the All Blacks was in 1953 - but anything goes in fiction.” — Whakatane Beacon, 1/10/91

Former Welsh sporting hero, Bleddyn Morgan, is living happily in the idyllic New Zealand countryside with his wife and son. Suddenly, a startling deathbed confession half a world away changes everything. He is called upon to defend the honour of Wales in a replay of a controversial 1966 All Blacks / Wales rugby match. The All Blacks' reputation is also on the line. They have to prove that the only reason they lost was because Wales cheated.

Old Scores was inspired by the first ever test match played in 1905 against the Welsh. Wales won the game after a try was disallowed by the referee who had failed to keep up with play and was 40 yards from the action. The result was a bone of contention between Welsh and New Zealand fans for decades.

“It’s not only old boys from the world of rugby who scrum down for Old Scores. Just as familiar as the cauliflower ears of the All Black legends they stand alongside are the weathered mugs of stage and screen veterans Martyn Sanderson, John Bach, Tony Barry, Roy Billing and Terence Cooper. The irony is while they have paid their acting dues, none is a household name - unlike Grizz Wyllie or Ian Kirkpatrick or Waka Nathan. This review isn’t the place to analyse why more emphasis is placed on sport than the arts in Kiwi culture (witness the budget cuts to film industry funding but not the Hillary Commission) but Old Scores is unlikely to get offside with impassioned proponents of either. A good-natured romp about Kiwi-Welsh rivalries on and off the field, it will amuse even those who don’t follow the sport. When the deathbed confession of a Welsh touch judge reveals New Zealand was cheated out of winning a controversial match, old sores are reopened and the honour of both countries is at stake. The respective rugby unions decide the match must be replayed, with the original team of 25 years earlier. Assigned to literally whip the greying All Blacks into shape is the mean and ornery Acid Aitken, an intensely zealous coach played with malicious relish by Martyn Sanderson. His ripe performance is the highlight of Old Scores, as he bullies and bleats into submission a team which includes an alcoholic, a Catholic priest and a Salvation Army officer who’s gone from being ‘Murray the Mad Monster’ to Murray the mouse. The spirited screenplay by former Junior All Black Greg McGee (Foreskin’s Lament) and Dean Parker (Came a Hot Friday) also concerns the plight of a Welsh rugby hero who’s since become a contented Kiwi family man with a secret reason for not wanting to return home... Naturally, some of the biggest laughs are rugby-oriented but inside sporting knowledge isn’t needed to appreciate the gags about human nature and hyped-up nationalism.” — ‘Old Scores a winner as unpretentious, good-natured Kiwi romp’, Philip Wakefield, The Evening Post, 23/9/91

“Move over God. Rugby rules, OK. (Union, that is). If Old Scores is a carefully devised publicity stunt for the rugby union World Cup then its timing and quality is superb, with some great dollops of nostalgia, aging but recognisable real jokers, and the best excuse for solid stoush on the field anyone has produced anywhere. It makes the game look attractive, being a spectator totally enjoyable, and being a rugby groupie or wife a role any red-blooded woman would go to battle for. The story is simple enough. Wales cheated in a rugby union test, and when this is discovered a couple of decades later, the two original teams - All Blacks and Welsh - are reassembled to replay the game. The process of settling old scores goes on both on and off the field, hilariously hampered by the age and changed physical ccondition of the former star players. If it has been produced as a regular movie, then it is still pretty commendable. It zips along at pace, scarcely pausing for the occasional swerve to attack its rival, Rugby League, or highlight the ability of the Welsh to play the dirty game. It has some good jokes and the odd ironic but fond tilt at the game. Old Scores also contains some surprises, like the casting of the normally villainous John Bach as a Salvation Army officer - even though his ‘rugby coach’ Martyn Sanderson still manages to turn his movie character back into Mad Murray the Monster of Cardiff. And most surprising of all, even if you are not a follower of the national religion, you might just find this film more rewarding than you expected.” — Sam Edwards, Waikato Times, 21/9/91

“Old Scores is an enchanting tall story, told with massive amounts of verve. Larger-than-life characters, a handful of sub-plots and simple gags are its books and backbone; if it errs at all, it is in the intorduction of the dramatic touch. Morgan has long since emigrated to New Zealand, and for reasons that unfold with the sotry, he wishes never to return. It has to do with his brother, the borther’s wife, and long-forsaken love. This is the kind of business which works only when the outcome is uncertain, but in a film like this, the choices are all foregone conclusions. Much stronger is Windsor Davies playing Evan Price, chairman of the Welsh Rugby Union, swooshing around Wales in a limo with a Welsh flag and a “WRU” number plate. Or Roy Billing as Father Frank O’Riordan, half-back turned priest. Best of all is Martyn Sanderson as Acid, the coach of the 1966 team. Sanderson, in the best role of his career, turns in a wicked caricature of the notorious Fred Allen, the man known as ‘The Needle’. Threats, personal abuse and a primitive form of motivational therapy are Acid’s stock in trade. At one point he has the team chant ‘The bloody Welsh won’t bloody bloody win because bloody Acid won’t bloody well let them!’ In fact, Sanderson is so good, with his scrawny, sly looks and his sergeant major’s manner that his performance is somewhat tainted by over-exposure. It is hard to avoid the suspicion that the producers realised at some point they were on to a good thing with Sanderson, and wrote him an extra-generous helping... If quibbles there are, they are all well outweighed by the pluses. Director Alan Clayton and lighting cameraman Alan Guilford make all the right decisions, getting the best from the rough faces, working the details, making the most of two very different but equally scenic countries, and still managing to push the story along at a good clip. A strong selling point for Old Scores both here and in Wales will be the presence of actual test players as non-speaking actors. Far more Welsh than All Blacks for some reason, and less novelty value for Kiwi - of the four ex-All Blacks in the movie, Grahame Thorne and Grizz Wyllie are familiar figures on our TV screens. You can’t help but wonder why; surely ex-All Blacks would be queuing up to be in the best, the most entertaining, and possibly the only rugby movie ever made. Never mind. In this sort of thing, the story is everything, and your average Kiwi (and your average Welshman) will watch Old Scores with a huge, comfortable grin that will last way beyond its perfect shaggy-dog ending.” — Chris Hegan, Listener, 14/10/91

Screenings:Old Scores screened as part of the Reel Festival on 8 and 10 September 2011; 22