Powell and Pressburger

[vaggmk1938]

I think one of the figures dancing on the Beach at the party is Robert Helpmann. I have checked IMDb and he does not appear in the credits. He was in Australia during the making of this movie, and as he was such a P & P favorite, I thought it might be possible.

I finally made a screen grab with the help of a hacker's page, but do not know how to send it up as I do not have a website and my Foxfire brower only accepts URL's--I use a Mac and do not have Snapz Pro X.

Is there any way to send an image from my computer?

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by vaggmk1938 I think one of the figures dancing on the Beach at the party is Robert Helpmann. I have checked IMDb and he does not appear in the credits. He was in Australia during the making of this movie, and as he was such a P & P favorite, I thought it might be possible. I finally made a screen grab with the help of a hacker's page, but do not know how to send it up as I do not have a website and my Foxfire brower only accepts URL's--I use a Mac and do not have Snapz Pro X. Is there any way to send an image from my computer?

You can upload it to a free image sharing site like PhotoBucket and then put it in a message by clicking on the icon when you write the message.

Steve

[ChristineCB]

Originally Posted by Steve Crook We'll have to see what we can do about extracts...

I would never want to jeopardize the valuable resources with illegal file-sharing. Hopefully, there are sufficient storage locations so that these great files are backed-up for a more certain data-retrieval project, if necessary.

After all, poor Ady and his lost photos are a good lesson for me.

("Not that I'm suggesting anything, hrumph, hrumph...")

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by ChristineCB I would never want to jeopardize the valuable resources with illegal file-sharing. Hopefully, there are sufficient storage locations so that these great files are backed-up for a more certain data-retrieval project, if necessary. After all, poor Ady and his lost photos are a good lesson for me. ("Not that I'm suggesting anything, hrumph, hrumph...")

I have a very good relationship with Thelma Schoonmaker and many of the surviving "Archers" or their family and I definitely wouldn't want to jeopardise that

Steve

[JamesM]

During my research this week, I discovered that Kenneth Rick (b.1914, 2nd asst director on Black Narcissus and The Red Shoes) passed away in 2004.

[ChristineCB]

Steve, if you ever have a chance to share some RightsHolder stories (even fantasies), I'd love to hear what a group like the Archers and Their Heirs have to say about DVD production. That's obviously another thread, but if you ever have some stories about what they've gone thru, their experiences, concerns...

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by ChristineCB Steve, if you ever have a chance to share some RightsHolder stories (even fantasies), I'd love to hear what a group like the Archers and Their Heirs have to say about DVD production. That's obviously another thread, but if you ever have some stories about what they've gone thru, their experiences, concerns...

Well this thread seems appropriate as it's about P&P.
Thelma Schoonmaker & Martin Scorsese have been most helpful to many of the DVD producers. Not only making giving the rights to the films (Thelma is the rights holder for The Powell Estate) but also making sure they have the best prints available. They have also done documentaries and commentaries, mainly for the Criterion series but also for the French series from L'Institut Lumière and this recent DVD of Peeping Tom from Optimum. They have also given access to their collections of memorabilia and their memories.

Others that have been equally helpful are Columba Powell, Micky's younger son, mainly talking about his appearance in PT. Kevin Powell, Micky's older son, worked on the Australian films and liked it so much that he's been living there ever since. Emeric's grandsons, Andrew & Kevin Macdonald both helped with the first documentary about IKWIG and Kevin made the documentary about Emeric to go with the biography that he wrote. Andrew is a producer, working mainly with Danny Boyle. Kevin is a film-maker who has won prizes for his documentaries One Day in September, Touching the Void and his first feature film, The King of Scotland.

There are also people like Hein Heckroth's grandson, Christian Routh, now living in Spain. He's helped by talking about Hein and giving access to some of Hein's archive.

And of course there are also the surviving Archers, like Jack Cardiff, Chris Challis, Noreen Ackland. And those that were in front of the camera like Sheila Sim & Dickie Attenborough, John Sweet & Kathleen Byron and quite a few that had the junior, but equally important roles in the making of the films. And the ones that have recently departed this life like Freddie Francis.

I don't think that any of them have ever refused to help and do what they can when they've been approached. And they're all such nice people. Even those that have gone on to do lots of other things are still quite proud of their association with the P&P films, however small their part. And quite willing to share those memories.

And there are also the academics and other people that have been great contributors like Prof Ian Christie, Bertrand Tavernier, Frixos Constantine, Andrew Moor and the late lamented Nick Burton from Canterbury Christchurch College.

Many years ago, when we started out email group and the web site, it was quite rare and quite hard to see the films so one of our main reasons for setting it up was to alert each other about screenings and video releases. When the P&P films were released on video they were often released in quite small batches and would quickly go out of print so we had to get our orders in quickly.

Now we're in the wonderful position of being spoilt for choice for the major films with nearly all of them having a DVD release in some form, many having 5 or 6 different versions available. But the email group is still going strong, as is the web site and now it's rare for a month to go by without at least one screening.

We've had academic conferences to discuss their work in France and in the UK. There have been many books written about them and they've been the subject of quite a few PhD theses. Their films have been a major feature at quite a few film festivals and they are now introduced to film students and often studied in detail. That's all very different to the situation in the 70s and 80s when it was hard to find anything about them and almost impossible to see the films. Now it is assumed that anyone interested in British film has seen at least their major films.

And the group of admirers of their films just keeps on growing. As well as the email group of a few hundred people around the world, we have our annual location walk in the Canterbury area which usually attracts 70-100 people. We have screened Gone to Earth in the Shropshire village where it was made and that attracted so many people that there had to be two screenings.

But I think one of the most amazing events, even more amazing than the 40 films in 10 days at the San Sebastian film festival in 2002, was the screening of AMOLAD in the courtyard of Somerset House on the banks of the Thames in London. It was projected on a screen that was about three stories high in front of an audience of about 2,000 people, many of them looking to be just in their thirties. I'm always in tears at the end of AMOLAD, but if I wasn't, the sight of all those young people giving a standing ovation to a 60 year old film...

Steve

[ChristineCB]

I can imagine! (In fact, that's about all I can do at this point - imagine the big screen showings of some of these!) But the recent Tarantino symposium on color cinematograhy was judged by him as "the best ever" because of his use of BLIMP Vs. CANTERBURY, and he said his own personal debate over color vs. B&W grew more contentious as that week went on. "Thank you, Jack Cardiff," was QT's phrase.

[Steve Crook]

It does need some dedication, or just sheer stupidity, sometimes.
I had helped a little bit organising and promoting the P&P screenings at the San Sebastian film festival in 2002 (over 40 films in 10 days, including all the available early films). For that they granted me a press pass so that I could see whichever films I wanted and get into the press centre and use their facilities.

But then about a month before it was due to start, my appendix burst!
Not just caused problems, but actually burst. I was in hospital for nearly two weeks. Mainly just struggling to fight the poisons that released into my blood stream. It was quite close. The surgeon told me that I knocked on Death's door - but luckily Death wasn't in that day.

As soon as I got out I started to rush around getting my passport renewed and organising the flight & hotel. There was no way I was going to miss this.
**Warning** Gory bit
The wound was left deliberately open so that it'd heal from the inside and so expel any remaining gunge. I had to get it cleaned and dressed every day. At first this was done by a visiting district nurse, but then I showed the nurses and my doctor, that I could do it myself, so they gave me the OK to travel - with a load of medical dressings in my suitcase.

That's why I wore red braces (see pics). I couldn't wear a belt as it pressed against the wound.

Of course having the company of a French friend, the lovely Natacha, was an added bonus. She speaks French & English. I speak English and German. Neither of us spoke Spanish and the festival was in NW Spain, far from the usual tourist trails. So apart from in the hotel & film centre, not many people spoke much English. But we got by with lots of smiling and pointing.

But we did discover that although we couldn't understand the spoken Spanish, especially with the Basque accent they have, we could read Spanish in the newspapers published for the festival. As Spanish is a Latin based language we could identify words that were similar to words in the languages we knew and then we'd look up the few words we didn't understand in our dictionaries.

As well as Jack Cardiff and Prof Ian Christie who we both knew already. It also gave us a chance to meet many new friends including one dancer who had been in Powell's Luna de Miel (1959) which was filmed in Spain with a Spanish dance troupe. To see the newly restored film in its full glory, in Spain with a Spanish audience including one of the stars, was superb.

We went in to see one film and were only just in time. It was quite crowded but Natacha spotted a couple of seats part way along one row. I asked the bloke sitting at the end of the row if we could pass and it was only when he stood up that I recognised Francis Ford Coppola, another P&P fan.

On the plane home I spotted Bob Hoskins who had been awarded a prize at the festival. While we were waiting for our luggage at Heathrow I congratulated him on that, thanked him for all the wonderful films he's made and then asked if I could shake the hand that throttled Roger Rabbit. He laughed at that and shook my hand, a very nice man.

All in all a wonderful time and a perfect remedy for a near death experience.

Steve

[vaggmk1938]

Here is the possible Helpmann dancer--hope this works, please forgive, if it does not, this is my first shot!

[vaggmk1938]

It did!

Please let me know from this rather murky shot if you think it is Robert Helpmann.

Many thanks

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by vaggmk1938 It did! Please let me know from this rather murky shot if you think it is Robert Helpman. Many thanks

Ah, I know the chap you mean now. He's quite prominent in the dance on the beach. If he had been Sir Bobby, I think someone would have noticed before now. Although he does have a bit of a look of Bobby about him. But I'm quite sure he isn't Bobby.

Thanks for making the effort though.

Steve

[vaggmk1938]

Was sure someone would have noticed it, had it been "Sir Bobby," but this fellow is so graceful, and obviously a trained dancer, I thought I would ask the experts, just to make sure!

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by vaggmk1938 Was sure someone would have noticed it, had it been "Sir Bobby," but this fellow is so graceful, and obviously a trained dancer, I thought I would ask the experts, just to make sure!

It could well have been a member of the Australian Ballet which had been set up just a few years earlier and Bobby was its director from 1965-76

Steve