CaptainWaggett

Sid's parents had been music hall entertainers and he was in whatever the SA equivalent of ENSA was during the war. And his second wife was a dancer. Didn't he play one of the gangsters in the London production of Kiss Me Kate? Danny Green was the other, I think. He must have had to do a bit of hoofing in that ('Brush Up Your Shakespeare')

batman

Dancing with Crime - an above average post war crime melodrama with good performances from Dickie Attenborough and Bill Owen.

Don't miss out on a chance to win a rare film in Bat-Quiz 13 closing date - 31/8/8.

Harbottle

Last few days viewing:

Tiara Tahiti (1962) DVD-R. Fun film helped greatly by excellent playing from the two leads James Mason and John Mills, Mason is a feckless toff while Johnny is a lower orders type who has done well for himself though hard work, but managing to nurture a chip on his shoulder.

The Deadly Affair (1966) R2. DVD. Due to another film company owning the right to the George Smiley name, James Mason’s character is renamed Charles Dobbs in this excellent John Le Carre spy story. Pretty gripping with an excellent cast including stalwarts Harry Andrews, Roy Kinnear and Max Schell. I did find the usual problems with old George (sorry Charles) nympho wife a tad tiresome, but that apart a very entertaining film indeed.

Fear in the Night (1972) R2. DVD. Quite a challenge while recovering from flu to remain awake watching this one but I just about managed it. An incredibly tedious film not really helped by a rather dozy performance by Judy Geeson, admittedly the poor woman does not have a lot to work with thanks to a woefully thin plot and torpid direction. Not nearly enough is seen of Peter Cushing and Joan Collins is underused also.

Murder Most Foul (1964) R2. DVD. Splendid comedy/mystery, with Margaret Rutherford quite wonderful as Miss Marple in her penultimate film outing in the role, an excellent cast too with Ron Moody in especially fine form.

Seven Waves Away (1957) DVD-R. Following the sinking of a cruise liner, Tyrone Power is the senior officer aboard an overcrowded lifeboat of survivors, remarkable film as Power has to make ghastly decisions to enable as many as possible to survive. Superbly played by all concerned with a large cast of well know British faces doing their stuff including Gordon Jackson, Katie Boyle, James Hayter, Stephen Boyd, John Stratton and Victor Maddern.

A Pemberton

An over the top Peter O Toole is Pink, a drunken lord
falling in love with his sister and on the verge of madness
The likes of Susannah York,Michael Craig and Harry Andrews
cant keep up with the maelstrom that is O Toole
More of a stage play than a film.
Worth watching only for O Toole

stevie boy

The Deadly Affair is in my opinion the perfect film. Also apart from the leads there is fabulous support from Harry Andrews,Roy Kinnear and Kenny Haigh, great film

smudge

MAD ABOUT MEN - Glynis Johns on wonderfully frothy and frivolous form as 'wayward' mermaid Miranda, in an entertaining sequel. Nice support from Dora Bryan as her finny friend.

DR. WHO AND THE DALEKS - with Peter Cushing perhaps miscast as the BBC's errant Time Lord hits the big screen for the first time. IMO a somewhat hesitant performance from the great man. Initially bumbling and doddery, Cushing's incisive and authoritative tones soon cut through, but he seems to drift between the two thereafter. The film does benefit from expansion into widescreen, with some very nice design touches and photographic themes...

Smudge

Welcome to my house. Enter freely, and of your own will...

Steve Crook

Glynis is good in Mad About Men, but the original, Miranda, is much, much better

Steve

intervision

Watched the DVD release of Armchair Thriller - Rachel In Danger. Can't wait for the offical release of Quiet As A Nun.... you know the one with the tower and the Nun with no face....

Steve Crook

Felicia's Journey (1999) - with Bob Hoskins as the Birmingham catering manager who looks out for stray young girls. Bob does a most unusual (for him) blonde dye job and Birmingham / Black Country accent

Steve

maturin

Just watched and very much enjoyed the first two episodes of Series 1 of Danger Man. I'd read on Wikipedia and in other reviews that Danger Man is seen as a kind of non-erotic, non-violent precursor to Bond, partly due to Patrick McGoohan's qualms concerning gratuitous violence.
In the two episodes I watched one man is beaten to death, one into unconsciousness; two are shot to death, one wounded.
That doesn't seem a particularly low count for a 1960s show. Perhaps those reviewers who see the series as non-violent are referring to the 1964 series, in which I imagine Patrick had more say?
The episodes I saw were surprisingly engrossing - I'm looking forward to watching the rest.
Richard

Harbottle

The Suspect (1960) DVD-R. Interesting spy thriller with a fine cast of British stalwarts, Prof Peter Cushing and his team of scientists Kenneth Griffith, Tony Britton and Virginia Maskell find there discovery put on the secret list. A sub-plot includes a fine performance by Ian Bannon as a severely disabled ex-serviceman who introduces Britton to shifty Donald Pleasence. The somewhat out of place presence of Spike Milligan adds some welcome touches of comedy to the proceedings.

Fragment of Fear (1970) DVD-R. Intriguing film where David Hemmings attempts to discover who was responsible for his Aunt’s murder in Rome. Difficult film to comment on without spoiling it…. So I won’t! Just to say that it is a very unusual piece of film making and well worth tracking down.

stevie boy

My weekly fix of Amanda & Hayley in Wild at Heart. The guy who plays Du Plesis is very good

smudge

THE ENTERTAINER (1960) - after reading about it in Ossie Morris' memoirs...

Excellent performances all round, although I did wonder for most of the film where Olivier's accent was going; even if Archie was stuck in a moribund Morecambe theatre, his voice was going on a national tour...

Olivier (I think) didn't really kick in with his performance until the latter part of the film. Rice's character is shown as somebody who is always running away from his failings, to a new show, a new girl, a new idea... At the end of the film Olivier makes it obvious that he wasn't running away from them - he knew each and every single one all along.

Brilliant turn from Brenda de Banzie as the disintegrating wife on the verge of alcoholism. Mention must also be made of the sterling work by Roger Livesey as Grandad - the man whose reputation Archie must live up to, yet fails to so miserably...

Damn good film - not great maybe, but damn good.

Smudge

Welcome to my house. Enter freely, and of your own will...

Steve Crook

That was a shame...

I watched an episode in the Battlefront documentary series on National Geographic. It was about Operation Market Garden - The Bridge Too Far, an operation that has long fascinated me.

I was a bit wary of this one as they were trying to cram the whole operation into a half hour show - with breaks for adverts. As it happened, they did concentrate mainly on the group that got to Arnhem bridge.

But the worst thing was that they'd COLORIZED all of the footage

It was all the footage filmed during the operation (at least they didn't try any "dramatic reconstructions") that I've seen quite often before - but colorized.

Why is it that people doing the colorizing always choose such vivid colours? Is it to make it obvious that they've added some colour? And none of the colours were quite right. The foliage used as camouflage by vehicles and men was painted a very vivid green. The uniforms were a reddish brown instead of khaki. The red berets were the wrong shade of red.

Terrible. I'll have to go back and watch a few of my other videos of that operation to recover. Or maybe even watch A Bridge Too Far again

Steve

suzepulcheria

AND.....who else but Jack Buchanan taught Olivier the dance routines!

"I've come a long way you know!" "Equally long way to go back..."