After 24 years, wedding couple's film is returned – pity they've now split up

WHEN Margaret Bonnar collected what she thought was an 8mm home video of her son from her local Boots in 1986, she instead ended up with footage of a large wedding.

Now, almost a quarter of a century later, the cin film is finally destined to be delivered to its proper home in East Lothian.

Ms Bonnar, from Gloucestershire, spent 25 years trying to reunite the film with the bride and groom before eventually posting it on the internet, where Jayne Cowan , the sister of the groom, recognised her family.

Unfortunately, it had taken so long for the film to be sent to its rightful owners that the happy couple – who asked not to be identified – have now divorced.

But Ms Cowan, 41, said rediscovering the cin film was still a delight to the entire family who shared many happy memories of watching the silent footage with their father's commentary.

She said: "It's fantastic. We're all in it as well, which is great because we're quite a big family.

"We're very family orientated and there's a lot of the kids in it when they were young as well, so it's nice to have it."

Ms Cowan said her father, an ex-miner and foster parent, had about 17 years' worth of cin film reels.

She added: "It's a small clip considering the size of the collection, but it's an important one and seeing the footage has been a real boost for dad. I had forgotten how much film there was and it's made the whole family want to dig for more.

"Dad did get a video camera later but there was something about cin film. It just wasn't the same. We would order in films and he would do the voices for the characters. We have a lot of great memories. I'm hoping they will all be clearer when we put them on DVD."

Father of the groom and father-of-six Alec Whyte, 75, added: "It's nice to see it turn up after all these years. It's a part of family history."

There were originally two reels sent for development by Boots to its central processing after the wedding in 1986 but only one returned, so the family assumed the other was ruined.

In fact, the footage had been sent to Margaret Bonnar, of Stroud, Gloucestershire, who had been expecting film of her son Jonathan.

Ms Bonnar, now 62, a self-confessed "hopeless romantic", spent years trying to track down the mystery couple. She had no clues as to who the film belonged and despite regular trips to Boots she was never able to find out anything about the happy couple.

She said: "I thought it had just been processed locally. I didn't realise that they were pooling all these cin films to be processed at a main centre, but that's what obviously happened.

"I must have spent months intensively making enquiries at Boots. I just thought it was a mix-up so we held on to it. It's still amazing that after 20 odd years we tracked them down."