After the war, James joined the Children’s Film Foundation. During his time there he directed many of their most famous films – "Betty the Yeti" (1952), "Stop that Elephant!" (1955), "Melvin’s Magic Marbles" (1961) and of course who could forget that it was James who gave Dennis Waterman his big break by casting him as the lead in "Not bad for a Cockney Lad" (1959).

Inevitably, James grew tired of the rather formulaic scripts he was being offered by the Foundation and decided to write his own. The result was "Harold Wilson has only got one ball" (1965). Although on the surface it appeared simply to be a tale about a boy named Harold Wilson who has his football stolen, it was in reality a savage satirical attack on the Labour government of the day. James had gone too far and was told that his services were no longer required.

Now that he was free to pursue his own projects, James embarked on a more experimental style of filmmaking. The result was his trilogy of philosophical documentaries beginning with "A Sense of being Plankton" (1972) and followed by "Zeitgeist of the Matterhorn" (1973) and "Existential Lollipop" (1974). Today these are art house classics and it’s hard to imagine the impact that they had on film making at the time. James became something of a celebrity and his autobiography, "Point the bloody camera over there! –A life in film" (Faber & Faber – 1975) stayed at the top of the bestseller lists for over a year. He also famously appeared on "Parkinson" that year, where he called Michael Parkinson "a long-haired tosser". Afterwards he apologised explaining that he had over-indulged in the green room before the recording. He also appeared on "The Russell Harty Show" where he punched Rod Hull who had tried to attack him with Emu.

This outrageous behaviour did nothing to dent his popularity. His next project was the rockumentary, "Ozzy Osbourne: The Man, The Myth, The Extremely Large Drinks Bill" (1978) which scored the notable coup of a cameo appearance by Martin Scorsese as ‘Short man with very bushy eyebrows’. A proposed sequel "Ozzy: Dried-Out and Ready to Rock", unfortunately never came to fruition.

The early Eighties was a difficult time for the British film industry and even MacGregor found it difficult to get projects off the ground. He did manage to secure funding for "A Cow named Thatcher" (1983) - a damning satirical criticism of Thatcherism disguised as the story of a simple-minded farmer and Thatcher, his Jersey cow. It should come as no surprise that James was known privately as "that little turd" within the walls of 10 Downing Street.

A political out-cast, James now found it impossible to find financial backing. In 1985 he announced his retirement from filmmaking. He now lives a reclusive life on a remote Scottish island with his 20-year-old trophy wife and extensive wine cellar. However he does still find time to write his Northern Exposure column drawing on fifty-plus years of experience, his wide-ranging contact list and a thick dossier of blackmail photographs. The second volume of his autobiography, "James MacGregor: The Seventies were a bit of a blur, I’m afraid" will be published in the autumn.

"James MacGregor taught me everything I know about filmmaking. In fact I’ve forgotten most of it. Does anybody have his phone number?" – Michael Winner

"James who?" – Alan Parker