Jenny Agutter to reprise Railway Children role in film sequel

Jenny Agutter (centre) with Sally Thomsett and Bernard Cribbins in The Railway Children

Classic children's film The Railway Children is to receive a sequel, more than 50 years after the original.

Sheridan Smith will star alongside Jenny Agutter, who is reprising her role as Bobbie Waterbury.

The iconic Keighley & Worth Valley Railway from the original film will also feature.

Shooting on The Railway Children Return will begin on Monday, led by Bafta-winning director Morgan Matthews. The film is due in cinemas on 1 April 2022.

The original film was based on the novel by E Nesbit about three children who are shipped off to live in the country beside a railway line after their father is arrested on mysterious spying charges.

Agutter played the eldest child in a 1968 TV adaptation, followed by the film two years later. She also played the mother in an ITV remake in 2000.

Now 68, in recent years she has played Sister Julienne in the BBC's Call the Midwife.

Sheridan Smith (left) will join Agutter in the sequel

The 1970 film became a massive hit and earned three Bafta nominations. It currently holds a "100% fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 11 critics' review.

The sequel will follow a group of children who are evacuated to a Yorkshire village during World War Two, where they encounter a young soldier who, like them, is far from home.

Tom Courtenay will also appear, with the script by Danny Brocklehurst, whose credits include TV shows like Brassic, Accused, Clocking Off and Shameless.

Sequels that have been a long time coming

The Railway Children Return arrives more than half a century after the original - but that's not the longest gap between movies.

That honour goes to Bambi II, which arrived 63 years after Walt Disney's animated classic.

It's not the only Disney movie to have a long wait between instalments. Fantasia and Fantasia 2000, for example, were separated by 59 years, 11 US presidents and one World War.

Other long-gestating sequels include The Return To Oz, which was released 46 years after The Wizard Of Oz; and Blade Runner 2049, which took 35 years to come to the big screen (although the action was only set 30 years in the future).