Gavin Scott

Gavin Duncan Scott (born 1950) is an English novelist, broadcaster and writer of the Emmy-winning mini-series The Mists of Avalon, Small Soldiers, The Borrowers and Legend of Earthsea, spent ten years making films for British television before becoming a screenwriter, creating more than two hundred documentaries and short films for BBC and the commercial TV, including UK’s prestigious Channel 4. His first assignment in the United States was with George Lucas, developing and scripting The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. His work ranges from family entertainment to comedy, science fiction and historical dramas.

Scott wrote Krakatoa, a Titanic-style movie for National Geographic Feature Films, and an eight-hour adaptation of War and Peace for Lux Vida SPA, directed by Robert Dornhelm (Into the West, The Ten Commandments).

He created and executive produced a 22 part television series set in the nineteenth century about the origins of the creative ideas of Jules Verne, which was broadcast around the world.

The Borrowers

The Borrowers is a children's fantasy novel by the English author Mary Norton, published by Dent in 1952. It features a family of tiny people who live secretly in the walls and floors of an English house and "borrow" from the big people in order to survive. The Borrowers also refers to the series of five novels (The Borrowers and four sequels) that feature the same family after they leave "their" house.

The Borrowers won the 1952 Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's outstanding children's book by a British subject. In the 70th anniversary celebration of the medal in 2007 it was named one of the top ten Medal-winning works, selected by a panel to compose the ballot for a public election of the all-time favourite.

Harcourt, Brace and Company published it in the U.S. the next year with illustrations by Beth and Joe Krush.

Series

All five Borrowers novels feature a family surnamed Clock: Pod, Homily, Arrietty. In the first book they live in a house reportedly based on The Cedars where Norton was raised. The sequels are titled alliteratively and alphabetically: The Borrowers Afield (1955), The Borrowers Afloat (1959), The Borrowers Aloft (1961), and The Borrowers Avenged (1982). All were originally published by J. M. Dent in hardcover editions.Puffin Books published a 700-page trade paperback omnibus edition in 1983, The Complete Borrowers Stories with a short introduction by Norton.

The Borrowers (1997 film)

The Borrowers is a 1997 British–American live-action fantasy comedy film based on the children's novel of the same name by author Mary Norton. In 1998 it was nominated for the title of Best British Film in the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) awards, but lost to Gary Oldman's Nil by Mouth. The film also picked up another two nominations and one win in awards. Some of the film's scenes were shot on location in the village of Theale, near Reading, Berkshire, where all of the buildings and shops in the High Street were painted dark green.

Plot

Young Pete Lender (Bradley Pierce) is setting up traps around his house, explaining to his parents that things in their house are being stolen, despite his parents believing otherwise. However, it turns out that a family of tiny people ("Borrowers"), are living in the house, borrowing stuff without being seen. Pod Clock (Jim Broadbent) and his children, Arrietty (Flora Newbigin) and Peagreen (Tom Felton), make their way through the kitchen to "borrow" the radio's battery. Arrietty, while treating herself with some ice cream in the freezer, is accidentally shut inside just as the Lenders return. Pod manages to rescue Arietty, but jams the ice cube tube in the process and is forced to leave one of his gadgets behind, which is found by Mr. Lender. Meanwhile, the will of Mrs. Lender's aunt Mrs. Allabaster is the only proof that the house rightfully belongs to the family, yet their lawyer Ocious P. Potter (John Goodman) cannot find it and has already made plans to demolish their house in order to build condominiums on the land, and the Lenders have until Saturday to move away.

The Borrowers (1973 film)

The Borrowers is a Hallmark Hall of Fame TV special first broadcast in 1973 on NBC. This made for television special is adapted from the 1952 Carnegie Medal-winning first novel of author Mary Norton's The Borrowers series: The Borrowers. The film stars Eddie Albert, Tammy Grimes and Judith Anderson and was directed by Walter C. Miller.

In 1974, the special was awarded an Emmy for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Children's Programming and was nominated for Outstanding Children's Special (producers Duane Bogie, Walt deFaria and Warren Lockhart), Outstanding Individual Achievement in Children's Programming (performer Judith Anderson), Outstanding Individual Achievement in Children's Programming (performer Juul Haalmeyer) and Outstanding Individual Achievement in Children's Programming (director Walter C. Miller).

The special tells the story of the Clock Family, tiny people who live under the floorboards in an old English house.

This movie is in the public domain.