and a miniature sheet showcasing the work of the GPO Film Unit, including the famous Night Mail:
The three 1st class stamps depict:
- A Matter of Life and Death (1946), starring David Niven and Kim Hunter (also released as Stairway to Heaven;
- Lawrence of Arabia (1962), starring Peter O'Toole and Alec Guiness;
- 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968), screenplay by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C Clarke.
The three £1.28 (subject to change) stamps depict:
- Chariots of Fire (1981), screenplay by Colin Welland
- Secrets and Lies (1996), starring Timothy Spall, Brenda Blethin, and Marianne Jean-Baptiste;
- Bend it Like Beckham (2002), starring Parminder Nagra, Keira Knightley
The 4 stamps on the miniature sheet show stills from Night Mail (1936), Love on the Wing (1938), A Colour Box (1939), and Spare Time (1939). We now understand that it will have 4 different values.
The miniature sheet is printed by Joh Enschede and the set by Cartor SP.
A pity this issue isn’t the one being released during Stampex, with the miniature sheet celebrating the work of the GPO Film Unit. So far this year’s issues are looking good (apart from the cost).
ReplyDeleteAfter last year's bumper set of Football stamps, there's yet another to add with "Bend It Like Beckham" following on from 2014's Joe Mercer, John Charles & Dave Mackay stamps.
ReplyDeleteA Bill Nicholson 100th birth anniversary commemorative stamp in 2016 would also be most welcome!
http://www.myfootballfacts.com/FootballOnGBStamps.html
On the face of it, it just looks like 2 girls celebrating their exam results and doesn't appear to have anything to do with football whatsoever. This stamp is a strong contender for the worst stamp of all time!
ReplyDeleteIt appears to be one of two images used for the DVD sleeve, and so will be instantly recognisable to many of those who have watched it. But I agree, to those who haven't, it means little.
DeleteBut the same could be said for 'Secrets and Lies" which looks like a still from one of many tv daytime programmes (I go by the pictures I see in the Radio Times - wouldn't want you to get the idea that I have time to watch daytime tv!). Chariots of Fire? - could be a bunch of public schoolboys after some sporting event. Context is everything. For that, the run down the home straight would seem more appropriate ?
Upon lookiong at these I am even more convinced that my decision to stop collecting commemoratives at the end of 2011 was a good one - in fact I think it was the best thing I've done for some time!
ReplyDeleteOh christ, another set of 1st class stamps, so far its only the horses and the trains with different values. As for the set, I'm not really bothered with them, there are some classics that could have been used, The Bells of St Trinans celebrates 60 years this year, talk about missing the boat, and they could have probably chuck in a Richard Curtis film. What an awful set, this year the sets have been pretty average apart for the Classic Children's programmes nothing else really stands out.
ReplyDeleteIn fact there are three x 1st class and 3 x airmail in the set of long stamps. Royal Mail advised yesterday that the miniature sheet will contain 1 x 1st class and 3 different higher values, rather than 4 x 1st.
DeleteWhy is it always 1st Class Stamps. Surely a nice set of 2nd Class stamps would not go amiss for once. So much for Royal Mail stating in the past, they would issue more 2nd Class.
ReplyDeleteI believe we will see at leas one 2nd class stamp in the remainder of the year, aside from Christmas. In Trade Briefings over the last 3 years Royal Mail have always said that the aim is for 'special' stamps normally to reflect the first class aim of the service and that there would be few 2nd class stamps.
DeleteImage choices have gone downhill ever since Royal Mail abandoned the principle of of no living (non-Royal) persons depicted on stamps.
ReplyDeleteI bought a miniature sheet from Stratford-upon-Avon today and just as with the Buckingham Palace miniature sheet, the selvedge at the left was attached to it with the barcode printed on it along with "MINI GBF" and the logo about the source of the paper used.
ReplyDeletePresumably the attached selvedge will be a continuing feature of future miniature sheets because of the presence of the barcode and if the m.s.'s from the Philatelic Bureau are sent out with the selvedge missing they will be incomplete items.
Official response from Royal Mail:
Delete"The inclusion of the barcode margin was at the request of Post Office Ltd. All Royal Mail products need to include barcodes as standard.
"We decided to add the margin to avoid putting the barcode in the design area of the product. The sheets sent out from Tallents House have had the margin removed because it is not intended to be part of the collectable product."
An interesting response. I guess that Royal Mail does not understand (or perhaps it understands too well) the psychology of collecting. Collectors simply must have whatever is made available for them to continue to have a complete collection. This goal is no longer achievable if the collector relies on buying their miniature sheets from the Philatelic Bureau since that little bit of selvedge makes what is obtained from the ordinary post office a different item from that which is sent to them from Edinburgh. No matter what Royal Mail's intentions were, it has created now created two "collectable products" where once there was one. And if anything, the sheet with the selvedge is the more "collectable" since that is the one that is more freely available to the general public for use on mail (as unlikely as it may be that members of the general public would use a miniature sheet on their mail). Oh dear.
ReplyDelete