Boys caned for watching adult-rated film at cinema

Another story deemed so important it had to be published in the biggest-selling newspaper in the UK.....

Boys caned over ‘X’ film

BOYS at a top public school were given a beating yesterday – for going to see an ‘X’ film without permission.

The boys, pupils at Tonbridge School, were caned by their headmaster, Mr. Michael McCrum – who is due to become head of Eton College later this year.

About fifty boys aged between 14 and 18 were punished. Not all got the cane.

Mr. McCrum said last night: “This was the largest number of pupils involved in a mass punishment since I became headmaster in 1962.”

The boys went to the local cinema on Saturday night to see “Easy Rider,” a film which includes scenes of drug-taking hippies and girls dancing naked.

They were reported by a senior pupil who had permission to go to the cinema and spotted the others there too.

“These pupils broke school rules,” said Mr. McCrum.

“They have ample opportunity for visiting the cinema and the school has a film club ... which was showing the Hitchcock film ‘Torn Curtain’ on Saturday night.”

As published in the Daily Mirror, 24 February 1970.

Picture credit: Sting Pictures

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