Welcome to British Isles Friday! British Isles Friday is a weekly event for sharing all things British and Irish — reviews, photos, opinions, trip reports, guides, links, resources, personal stories, interviews, and research posts. Join us each Friday to link your British and Irish themed content and to see what others have to share. The link list is at the bottom of this post. Pour a cup of tea or lift a pint and join our link party!

Last week, I reviewed the two-part mini-series adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Murder is Easy.

Marg was part of a blog tour for Making Memories at the Cornish Cove by Kim Nash, the third in a series of romances set in the fictional town of Driftwood Bay, Cornwall.

Heather shared three more British authors in her A to Z Challenge of recommended authors:

• Emily Larkin writes historical romances with a fantasy element.
• Debbie Johnson is the author of the Comfort Food Café books, set in Dorset.
• Terry Pratchett wrote the Discworld novels. Heather provides advice about where to start in the series (which has dozens of books) based on whether you prefer reading about witches or police. Fun!

Seventy-five years ago, this Sunday, the film Passport to Pimlico made its debut in UK cinemas. In 1949, World War II was fresh in people’s memories and rationing continued to be the order of the day.

In this era, Ealing Studios were at the height of production of comedies to lighten the spirits of war-torn Britain. Passport to Pimlico was released in the same year as another beloved British comedy — Kind Hearts and Coronets.

Pimlico was and is an area of London, just south of Westminster, bordered by Vauxhall Bridge Road, the railroad tracks from Victoria Station, and the River Thames.

In the story, the people of Pimlico discover old documents that make the case that they are not, in fact, in England but are a part of the Duchy of Burgundy (in what is now France). This discovery came with treasure, so Pimlico has some power to take on the British government. They set up a Burgundian state and begin negotiations with Britain.

The people of Pimlico, like everyone else, are tired of rationing. Black marketeers, out of the jurisdiction of Britain, arrive to meet the pent-up demands of the marketplace. This, naturally, causes its own problems.

An ever-escalating series of setbacks and solutions, plus a general air of ridiculousness, creates a lot of laughs, even for a modern audience. We can all relate to the tension between over-reaching state government and under-performing local government.

Passport to Pimlico is a timeless comedy. Have you watched it? What did you think?