Tube Station Movies Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Arsenal Stadium Mystery

Arsenal station, on the Piccadilly line in North London, was named after the football club who played their home matches at the neighbouring Highbury stadium. Prior to its renaming in 1932, the station was known by the road it was situated in, Gillespie Road. Even after Arsenal vacated Highbury in 2006 to move to a stadium in Ashburton Grove, the station retained its name.

The film, made just before the outbreak of World War II and released in 1940, begins with the high profile charity match between the amateur team, the Trojans and the star Division One team Arsenal. Shortly after half-time, with Arsenal leading by a single goal, the Trojans star striker collapses and dies. The police are called in and it is discovered that the player was poisoned. The eccentric Detective Inspector Slade, played by Leslie Banks, is appointed to lead the man hunt for the killer although his main concern is that the unravelling of the mystery doesn't interfere with his performance for the Police Amateur Dramatics Society.

Answer: Waterloo

Waterloo station, on the Bakerloo, Jubilee and Northern lines, was named after the famous battleground in Belgium at which Napoleon was defeated. In true British fashion, the station was the original terminus for all trains arriving from France after the opening of the Channel Tunnel in 1994.

The film, released in 1970 and directed by Sergei Bondarchuk, stars Rod Steiger as Napoleon Bonaparte and Christopher Plummer as the Duke of Wellington. It starts with Napoleon's abdication as Emperor of the French Republic and his subsequent exile and moves rapidly to its main concern - the battle itself. The film's renown, nowadays, is for the spectacular nature of the battle scenes, which included in the region of seventeen thousand extras mainly drawn from the Russian army.

Answer: Victor Victoria

Victoria station, named after Queen Victoria, who was on the throne when the station opened, is on the Victoria, District and Circle lines. The connecting overground station runs services to the South coast. The station was first devised as the terminus for the extension of the line that had served the Great Exhibition in 1851. The original line terminated on the south side of the river, and the extension took the trains across the river.

The film, a musical comedy directed by Blake Edwards and released in 1982, sees Victoria Grant, played by Julie Andrews, find success in Paris as her alter ego, Count Victor Grezinski. A Chicago gangster, played by James Garner, falls in love with the count and decides to come out of the closet as a result. The film won an Oscar for its score and six other nominations including Julie Andrews as best actress and Blake Edwards for best adapted screenplay.

Answer: The Bank Dick

Bank station is on the Northern and Central lines and is so named as it is situated alongside the Bank of England in the City of London.

WC Fields starred in "The Bank Dick" and wrote the screenplay under his pseudonym, Mahatma Kane Jeeves. The film frequently appears in the lists of the all-time great Hollywood comedies.

Answer: Passport to Pimlico

Pimlico station, in South-West London, is on the Victoria line.

After a bomb, left over from World War II, explodes in Pimlico, a hidden cellar from the old manor house of the area is revealed. Within the cellar some ancient parchments are discovered, which turn out to be a royal charter from King Edward IV ceding the borough of Pimlico to Charles VII, the Duke of Burgundy, during his exile there after the Battle of Nancy in 1477. Though the charter was meant to be temporary, it had never been revoked.

As part of Burgundy, the food rationing that the rest of Britain was subject to did not apply to Pimlico and soon the borough was swarming with crooks and black marketeers. The British government erected manned borders to prevent this racketeering and set up a blockade of the borough. The newly-proclaimed Burgundians respond by demanding excise duty from anyone passing through the borough on the tube trains beneath.

Answer: Angel Heart

Angel is a station in Islington on the Northern Line. It is one of five stations named after a nearby pub (the others being Elephant & Castle, Swiss Cottage, Manor House and Royal Oak); in Angel's case the name comes from a pub which lay on the corner of an important road intersection alongside the current station in Finsbury (now part of the borough of Islington). The pub existed at this location from at least the seventeenth century but had been replaced by the turn of the twentieth century. The current pub known as "The Angel" is next door to the site of the original.

The film, directed by Alan Parker and released in 1987, stars Mickey Rourke as Harry Angel and Robert de Niro as Cyphre. As Angel searches for Johnny Favourite, he finds every person who gets him closer to his target ends up dying in a gruesome manner including the beautiful Epiphany, played by Lisa Bonet.

"Angel Heart" was not critically well-received but became more successful on video than it had been in the cinema.

Answer: Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

"Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" is the second film in the "Indiana Jones" series following 1981's "Raiders of the Lost Ark". Harrison reprises the role of Indy in a film that is set one year before the adventures of the first film. Indy and his gang end up bailing out of the plane after crossing with Chinese gangster, Lao Che, over a diamond deal.

Indy escapes the deal in the plane, not knowing that it is owned by Lao Che. Believing they are safe, Indy and his companions sleep on the plane and whilst they rest, the pilots dump the plane's fuel and jump out with the only available parachutes, leaving Indy with only one option - floating to earth in an inflatable raft!

For those familiar with the film but not the tube station, Temple is situated on the banks of the River Thames in Central London and is a stop on the District and Circle lines. Its name comes from the nearby Temple Church, originally occupied by the Knights Templar. The church also gave its name to two of the Inns of Court (Inner Temple and Middle Temple), the associations that practising barristers must belong to in order to be allowed to practice law in the British courts.

Answer: A Chorus of Disapproval

OK so I've been a bit cheeky here by hiding the name of the station (Oval) within another word (but I could have been far more obscure had I been feeling so inclined!). Oval station is on the Northern Line and is situated in Kennington in South London. The station is named for the Oval cricket ground just down the round where Surrey County Cricket Club and England both play.

"A Chorus of Disapproval" released in 1988, starred Jeremy Irons as Guy Jones, a newcomer to the town who joins the amateur theatre company, run by Anthony Hopkins, as they rehearse "The Beggar's Opera". Jones' experiences in the town and with the theatre closely mirror those of MacHeath in "The Beggar's Opera".

Answer: 84 Charing Cross Road

Charing Cross station, situated just off Trafalgar Square on The Strand, is on both the Bakerloo and Northern lines and also is a mainline station serving the Kent and East Sussex commuter belt. Charing Cross Road runs from the junction of Oxford Street and Tottenham Court Road south to Trafalgar Square.

The film was released in 1987 and was based on Helene Hanff's book of 1970. The book tells the true story of the friendship that developed through a twenty year correspondence between Hanff (a BAFTA winning performance by Anne Bancroft) and Doel (Anthony Hopkins). The exchange of letters begins when New York-based Hanff contacts the bookshop in 1949, to enquire about some antique books that she has been unable to locate in her home city. A strong friendship develops as Doel provided the books that Hanff requests and Hanff sends gifts that help the staff of the bookshop through the hardships of post-war London.

Despite the deep affections that develop between the pair, Hanff never visits the bookshop until 1971, after it has closed and, sadly, never meets Doel either, as he dies of peritonitis in 1968.

Answer: Wimbledon

Wimbledon is a station on the District Line. However, the nearest station for the All England Championships (the official name of the tournament better known as "Wimbledon") is actually Southfields, two stops further up the line from the Wimbledon terminus.

The film sees the English pro, played by Paul Bettany, decide to have one last crack at claiming the Wimbledon title before he retires, after meeting Lizzie Bradbury, played by Kirsten Dunst. At the time of the film's release in 2003 it had been 67 years since a male English player had claimed the Wimbledon crown, when Fred Perry lifted the famous gold trophy for the third consecutive year in 1936.