Lease of Life

Lease of Life is a 1954 British film drama made by Ealing Studios and directed by Charles Frend. The film was designed as a starvehicle for Robert Donat, representing his return to the screen after an absence of over three years during which he had been battling the chronic asthma which plagued his life and career. It was a prestige production which was generally respectfully, if not overenthusiastically, received and gained Donat a nomination as Best British Actor at the 1955 British Academy Film Awards. In common with a number of other Ealing films of the era, Lease of Life focuses on a specific English milieu in this case a Yorkshire village and its nearby cathedral city and examines the nuances, quirks and foibles of its daytoday life. The film is unique in the Ealing canon in having religion as its dominant theme.

On discovering that he has less than a year to live, Thorne reevaluates his own life and his parishioners and he finds himself happier than before, as he now feels able to speak completely honestly about his beliefs and does his best to demonstrate to his parishioners that religion is not a matter of unthinking adherence to a fixed set of rules, but of freedom to act according to ones conscience. However some of his pronouncements are willfully misunderstood and deemed provocative and controversial. There also remains the worry about how to secure the necessary funds to pay for Susans tuition at a music college, and fate happens to put temptation in the way.Exterior sequences for Lease of Life were filmed in Beverley Gilchester and the nearby village of Lund Hinton St. John in the East Riding of Yorkshire. The railway scenes in the film were filmed at Windsor amp Eton Central station. ........

Source: Wikipedia