Michael Winner classics now on R2 DVD

[julian_craster]

Michael Winner classics now on R2 DVD from NETWORK/STRIKE FORCE !

(all titles produced by the legendary producer HAROLD BAIM)

Hope the prints are good......



THE COOL MIKADO (UK, 1963), with Stubby Kaye, Frankie Howerd, Lionel Blair, Pete Murray, Denis Price, Tommy Cooper, Mike and Bernie Winters. Scored by JOHN BARRY and Martin Slavin.



Once upon a time, Gilbert and Sullivan wrote their famous comic opera, The Mikado.

Any resemblance between their creation and this film is completely accidental!



Hank, son of American judge Herbert Mikado, refuses to marry his father’s chosen bride, the vampish Katie Shaw, and joins the army. He is then posted to Japan, where he meets and falls in love with the beautiful Yum-Yum. Unfortunately, she already has an avid suitor: infamous local gangster, Ko-Ko Flintridge…



In his first ever musical, Frankie Howerd stars as Ko-Ko alongside Tommy Cooper as incompetent private detective Pooh-Bah and Stubby Kaye as Judge Herbert Mikado in a high-camp reworking of Gilbert and Sullivan’s famous comic opera, directed by Michael Winner. Updated to the Swinging Sixties, The Cool Mikado features a gloriously incongruous soundtrack (with arrangements by John Barry and Martin Slavin), and is possibly the only production to boast a Three Little Maids that breaks into a Cha-Cha-Cha dance routine, a Lord High Executioner chorus with a Tijuana brass backing, and a bagpipe rendition of We are Gentlemen of Japan!



Special Features:

[] Girls, Girls, Girls

[] It's Magic

[] Image gallery





PLUS



BONUS SHORTS (30mins each) : Girls, Girls, Girls and It's Magic (the latter presented by David Jacobs)





Cool Mikado (The): Network DVD











Catalogue Number: 9971005

Time: 128 mins approx

Region: 2 / PAL

Subtitles: None

Sound: Mono / English

Picture: 1.33:1 / Colour

Number of Discs: 1

Classification: PG

Barcode: 5027626100544

[batman]

I may have to get myself a copy of this ... The Cool Mikado is as demented as Hellzapoppin' and is great fun.



A box-set of Winner's UK films wouldn't be out of place either ....



West 11

The System

The Jokers

I'll Never Forget What's 'Is Name

Hannibal Brooks

The Nightcomers

Dirty Weekend



.... how about that lot?

[Wee Sonny MacGregor]

But no sign of "Some like it Cool"?

[Freddy]

name='batman']I may have to get myself a copy of this ... The Cool Mikado is as demented as Hellzapoppin' and is great fun.



A box-set of Winner's UK films wouldn't be out of place either ....



West 11

The System

The Jokers

I'll Never Forget What's 'Is Name

Hannibal Brooks

The Nightcomers

Dirty Weekend



.... how about that lot?

My choice as well.

[darrenburnfan]

I don't think that Some Like It Cool, or any other naturist film from the 1950's and 1960's will be released on DVD any time soon. I remember seeing some of these films at the cinema decades ago. They were usually given an A certificate by the BBFC and the main reason they've never been shown on television or released on DVD is that some of them have naked children in them and these days would be regarded in law as child porn. In fact, the definition of child porn has changed considerably even since the 1970's when naturist films made for the cinema such as The Naked Peacock were made. Back then, the definition of child porn was images of children engaged in sexual acts with themselves, or with other children, or with adults. This has all changed since the 1980's and now any image of a naked child, even if shown innocently building sandcastles on a beach in a nudist film, is regarded in law as child porn...which, of course, is ridiculous when you come to think about it, but that's the way it is now. That's why the innocuous naturist magazine Health & Efficiency Monthly was banned in the UK about twenty years ago (however, I understand it became available again later and is still available, minus any images of children). However, if you are able to live long enough, you will probably see the law change again in another thirty years and these films and magazines will be allowed again, once all this present day paranoia about paedophilia has burned itself out.

[Wee Sonny MacGregor]

Thanks, Darren, a helpful explanation. The implication is that if MW made "Some Like it Cool" today, he's find himself on a register!



Not having seen any of these films for years, I may be wrong but I thought movies like Travelling Light and that one with Pamela Green, for some reason, focussed mostly on young ladies. I don't recall them featuring many children or people beyond the age of about 30 but perhaps I wasn't paying too much attention in that direction. I think I'd better stop there as it's beginning to look as if I have too detailed a knowledge of this genre.

[darrenburnfan]

As I remember it, Wee Sonny, the kids were usually in the background, running about and enjoying themselves, while the young women were usually covering their crotches with a large beach ball. There were some films that featured children more than others, though, such as Garden of Eden and The Naked Peacock that seemed to have been filmed in family orientated nudist camps. The kids were seen romping around on climbing frames; being pushed on the swings, or engaging in body painting.



Oddly enough and just to show that the law is an ass and very mixed up, certain films, such as Lord of the Flies; Kes and Walkabout, have been passed by the BBFC with the nude scenes intact. But for some reason, the nudist films are regarded differently. Maybe it's the combination of naked adults in the vicinity of naked children that worries them and the misguided belief that anyone filming the inhabitants of a nudist colony must be up to no good.