Halliwell's Film Guide

[Marky B]

Saw this book in Borders the other week. Daniel Craig's Casino Royale gets mention,but not the Bourne Ultimatum,which was made before.

Ta Ta

Marky B

[Dandelion]

Pretty much par for the course with Halliwell's Film Guide!

[Mr Sloane]

name='Dandelion']Pretty much par for the course with Halliwell's Film Guide!

I must say I don't Like Haliwell Guide now but still have the first one I bought in the 70's.

I know Leslie Halliwell was very conservative in his views but I do seem to enjoy the old films he enjoyed and share a lot of his likes and prejudices.

[pelam123]

name='Mr Sloane']I must say I don't Like Haliwell Guide now but still have the first one I bought in the 70's.

I know Leslie Halliwell was very conservative in his views but I do seem to enjoy the old films he enjoyed and share a lot of his likes and prejudices.

I agree that it wasn't the same book after his death even if he seemed to think that there weren't any good films made after the 1940's! Still I would have liked to have seen his comments on the cinema of the 90's and 00's, somehow I don't think he would have been too impressed.

[dpgmel]

Didn't he also produce a TV guide ? I'm sure somewhere at home I've got a copy gathering dust.

[Marky B]

name='dpgmel']Didn't he also produce a TV guide ? I'm sure somewhere at home I've got a copy gathering dust.

He did. I still have a copy.

Ta Ta

Marky B

[Tom Bancroft]

I don't know if it was networked or not, but here in the north west ITV (Granada or Channel 4?) broadcast a series of programmes in the 80's hosted by Halliwell about the British at war. He presented it almost as a visit to the cinema during the war, with a wartime propaganda piece (usually by Humphrey Jennings), a few bits about cinema going and life during the war and finishing off with a movie of the era.



Somewhere I have most of the episodes on VHS, but was the seies ever re-released on DVD?



I'm sure most of the officianados on this site will know already, but there is a very interesting site at www.lesliehalliwell.com which is worth a look.

[Rob Compton]

It was a fondly remembered C4 nationally networked series of films, Tom. If only these days...



I don't think any DVD ever appeared.



I hadn't seen the site before, thanks!



rgds

Rob

[bhowells]

Haliwell Filmgoers Companion was indespesible in its days, but it did have his shortcomings, filmographys for character and lesser known actors were often incomplete. I tend not to reach for HalIwells these days I go straight to IMD.



I was also not keen on his opionated comments for each entry, Elvis who Leslie must have disliked was described as aheavy lidded pop star and Anthony Newley was described as a disliekable singer/actor.



I was a big fan of the Television companion, the last edition I have was from 1985. I am not sure when this guide stopped being published.



The teleguide was always indespensible to me for the information about U.S.A shows, he was very good in this field as he was film and tv buyer for Granada. at one time.



What makes the 1985 edition particuraly interesting is the contributions by Phillip Purser.

[Reeldigger]

Halliwell's opinions were cranky, even a bit reactionary but, being a movie soundtrack buff, my dog-earred copy of his 1991 edition still gets heavy use. Where else can you find a composer listing for every major English-language movie without going on the Internet?

[glyn horton]

name='Marky B']Saw this book in Borders the other week. Daniel Craig's Casino Royale gets mention,but not the Bourne Ultimatum,which was made before.

Ta Ta

Marky B

It's also been revised over the years. There are many films in the 80s editions which are no longer in the current ones. There are also some pre 80s films listed now which Halliwell didn't include.

[Marky B]

name='bhowells']Haliwell Filmgoers Companion was indespesible in its days, but it did have his shortcomings, filmographys for character and lesser known actors were often incomplete. I tend not to reach for HalIwells these days I go straight to IMD.



I was also not keen on his opionated comments for each entry, Elvis who Leslie must have disliked was described as aheavy lidded pop star and Anthony Newley was described as a disliekable singer/actor.



I was a big fan of the Television companion, the last edition I have was from 1985. I am not sure when this guide stopped being published.



The teleguide was always indespensible to me for the information about U.S.A shows, he was very good in this field as he was film and tv buyer for Granada. at one time.



What makes the 1985 edition particuraly interesting is the contributions by Phillip Purser.

I think there was only one version of his Television Companion and I have it. Hardly used now with having IMDB.

Ta Ta

Marky B

[cornershop15]

name='Marky B']I think there was only one version of his Television Companion and I have it. Hardly used now with having IMDB.

Ta Ta

Marky B

I'd forgotten there was a TV Guide as well. Must try and get a copy from eBay. It's a sad reflection of our changing lifestyles that bhowells, Marky B and myself find it convenient to use IMDB more than (hitherto) trusty old books. And who promotes that site more often than me (seems like every post)?! I've wanted to contribute to the 'Problem Of Storage' thread, as I have hundreds of books, videos, CDs and now DVDs, but might find it too overwhelming to describe my own problems. Somebody there claimed to have 5, 000 DVDs, which I am unable to comprehend.



I can't have seen Mr. Haliwell's series on wartime films but was beguiled by his What The Censor Saw season, which he introduced. Saturday Night And Sunday Morning made SUCH an impact on me as an 18 year-old and Albert Finney became a great favourite after this showing in 1983. Other films included Repulsion, The Killing Of Sister George, This Sporting Life and I think Room At The Top. Exciting times in those early years of video recording.



Like others here, I also noticed Leslie Halliwell's apparent disrespect for later films (you probably think I take after him when I feel like dismissing anything after 1980), and continue to be disappointed with his reactions to the likes of Marnie and The Long Goodbye [a lot of 'dissing' there I just noticed!]. He's still the boss in terms of reference books, though, and I really miss the unique hold he had in that field before all the copyists joined in. In a way I'm jealous that he died 20 years ago as the sex, violence and swearing in films (and society) looks to have got totally out of control. Most of the time I can't bear it and retreat to the security of the past. We can only guess what Mr. Halliwell would have made of the other Colin Farrell and Samuel L. Jackson.



A great loss to us film buffs

[blacknorth]

I have the TV guide which, I think, is still very useful - it was written with Philip Purser whose opinions seem rather more tolerant than Halliwell's.



I threw out the actual film guide long ago, his opinions on cinema seemed pretty bizarre to me, though I liked the habit he had of dismissing works of art with clever one-liners.



His star rating system was pretty bizarre too - I seem to remember no stars meant a 'totally routine production' and most films fell into this category of no stars.



A friend told me the latest editions have removed quite a few of Halliwell's reviews and substituted them with the latest editor's judgements.

[m35541]

Back in the 1970's his works were pretty much the best in the field. I don't think there was anything to rival The Filmgoer's Companion for ages.



But, he'd basically lost it as far as anything made after about 1960 went.



His essay at the back of his film guide, written in about 1976, was a complete diatribe about virtually anything made in colour and cinemascope and anything that tried to convey some sort of message (the Vietnam war era of Hollywood when it went left-wing and radical clearly got up his goat immensely). So disenchanted was he that it was apparent he didn't even like the likes of Jaws and Star Wars when Hollywood once again re-invented itself in the mid/late 1970's.

[orpheum]

I boght the first ever Halliwell Guide when it came out and i used it for many years.It may seem difficult for many of the internet generation to believe but this was virtually the only such reference guide at the time.

[Reeldigger]

Halliwell wrote a book on horror movies, probably one of his last. I don't recall the title but it struck me as being a very half-hearted venture, neither particularly interesting or original. I was quite surprised when it came out because he never expressed much enthusiasm for the genre. I suspect the idea was foisted on him by the publisher since horror film books were quite marketable at the time.

[Rowdon]

I think it was called The Dead that Walk. I left it behind when I moved, so i can't check, but for a light-reading simple reference book it was ... still not very good.

[torinfan]

I used to have the Halliwell Filmgoer Companion from the 1990's and when I moved, that was one of the books that went out with the garage sale. I saved a few other film books but that was it.

[torinfan]

name='dpgmel']Didn't he also produce a TV guide ? I'm sure somewhere at home I've got a copy gathering dust.

Probably. It looks like he wrote a bunch of books. I know not all of them show up in this search but it's what I have available at hand:



User Verification - UA Library