Moor Larkin

I came a across a long article all about this film in a contemporary magazine. It sounded very good. It's strange how some films just fall out of the zeitgeist. I remember when Finch was lauded for the one he made just before he died, then I saw it and it was okay in a shouty-American sort of way, but this one sounds much better. I probably saw it on the TV once...................

Keechelus

Widescreen said, with eloquence: "This film proved so effective that you are still hoping for a chance to see it again, almost fifty years later. This is my experience with the Peter Finch picture, "No Love for Johnnie". Not every critic I have read hailed this film, but it is a handsomely produced and highly effective character-driven drama. Why does it remain consistently unavailable in any home entertainment format? "

Amen, brother. I was surprised and pleased to find a trader here in Canada who swapped me a JOHNNIE copy; and other folks have tipped us to E-bay etc.

But your point remains. Why is this well-written and superbly acted film not a full-featured DVD? Why aren't the copyright owners making their proper income by providing us with a legitimate DVD of one of Britain's best 1960's dramas?

It is a puzzle.

Thanks for your endorsement of NO LOVE FOR JOHNNIE - it gripped me when I saw it as a kid on Canadian TV forty years ago. A timeless story, it is just as good today.

A PS: One of the two credited screenwriters is Mordecai Richler, the acerbic Canadian novelist whose career was just about to take off when he co-scripted JOHNNIE. I'll bet some of JOHNNIE's most biting moments were Richler's contribution.

batman

It is the same puzzle that inflicts many fine British films.

I wish I had claws.

Keechelus

*sigh*

Bats, in Vancouver I can buy THE HOTTIE AND THE NOTTIE at Wal-Mart for the price of a Big Mac (without fries). If I look harder, Brit classics like FEVER PITCH, ABOUT A BOY and all the Spice Girls DVDs are there as well ... but try to find anything by Ken Loach or most of Tony Richardson's early films?

Grr. Where th' hell, even, is John Huston's AFRICAN QUEEN? It is on the AFI 100, and the only Region 1 DVD is a crummy Hong Kong release, just about VHS quality.

And grr, some more. BFI's short-lived DVD of A TASTE OF HONEY should be a worldwide best seller. But no, HONEY copies are traded on the grey market. A d*mn shame.

Steve Crook

It was H.L. Mencken who said "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public".

And of course that applies to other countries as well

Rubbish like that appeals to the great unwashed.
DVD producers want to sell lots of copies of their DVDs
So they readily produce DVDs that will sell well and make money

Some of the better DVD producers then use that money to produce DVDs of the better films, even though they know they might not sell enough of them to even recoup their costs

Steve

dpgmel

Through reading this thread I bought No Love For Johnnie off of one of the Greek sellers on Ebay and it arrived within a week.

Very pleased and thanks to all who bought my attention to it.

NappieB

The later film was probably NETWORK Finch's much remembered American foray. It still gains rave reviews here in the States and has even achieved catch-word status: "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!"

But NO LOVE FOR JOHNNY was infinitely better in all respects. I saw this movie when it was first released and agree with an earlier poster in this thread who said that almost 50 years on he still thinks about it...

"The future is yet to come" - George W. Bush

Mark O

Same here!

Watched this film yesterday evening and very good I thought it was too, I was intrigued by the scenes on the terrace at the Palace of Westminster, would a Film company be allowed to use it as a location I wonder?, probably not today!, though on closer inspection the Buses seen in the background crossing Westminster Bridge are pretend ones, I thought Mary Peach gave a good performance also, though I'd never heard of her before, it's a shame she didn't go on to be more famous!

Mark

Merton Park

I think she is married to Jimmy Sangster of Hammer Films fame and moved to the US in the early 1970's if not before.