His wife just left him for another man; and so did his boyfriend.... Ben (Bates) is a man full of energy that he doesn't know what to do with. He's lost a grip on what gives his life purpose he's not sure that teaching is of any use or that he's even meant to be a teacher and he's feasting off the dregs of his relationships. In this first American Film Theatre Collection release Harold Pinter makes a very impressive directorial debut creating intricate characterisations in a movi
Invasion of the Earthmen: Steed has a close escape and Tara has a close encounter. Investigating the disappearance of a fellow agent Steed and Tara find the Alpha Academy brought to their attention: what's the secret behind this sinister school where spacemen walk and boa-constrictors provide security? Our heroes must see themselves clear to keeping an eye on the pupils... The Curious Case of the Countless Clues: Steed helps a friend and Tara has a break. Has a friend of Steed's really committed murder? The evidence against him is strong and only the flimsiest of alibis stands between the man and prison. A gang of extortionists have been using a cunning scheme to get valuable works of art: if Steed's not careful he'll find it's not just the paintings which are being framed... Split! Steed studies handwriting and Tara is nearly in two minds. People are being assassinated by foreign agent Kartovski who is somehow able to reach his victims without them suspecting anything. But this isn't the only neat trick the killer is managing - for John Steed shot him in 1963! Tara and Steed begin the search for a dead man... Get-a-Way! Steed drinks a spy's health and Tara looks at lizards. An assassination campaign by three Russian agents is thought to have been nipped in the bud when they're captured and imprisoned in an inescapable facility. From which they promptly escape. Having learned he's on the hitlist Steed sets out to find the merciless killers who can seemingly vanish at will... Have Guns - Will Haggle: Steed hunts for a special gun and Tara hunts with one. Trampolining raiders steal a consignment of secret rifle the FF70 and an investigating Steed discovers an upcoming auction and a very interested party. Meanwhile Tara has been captured by murderous people who want her to help them with their sight tests... Wildest Dream
A broken wand forces Sooty to stop his magic show. With Sweep stuck in the sawing-in-half box and Richard transformed into a chicken, Sooty must put things right if he's going to impress World Famous Magicians Paul Daniels and Debbie Magee...
Carlos Varella (Carlos Thompson) is an import-export agent with a finger in every pie. Charming, elegant, sophisticated and widely travelled, he's the sort of man that people come to for help. With the aid of his secretary Suzy Carter, manservant Chin (the legendary Burt Kwouk) and fellow Mercury International employee Bill Randall, Carlos's devil-maycare attitude and infectious sense of humour see him through the stickiest of situations!
Elvis Presley stars as a rebellious backwoods delinquent gifted with a rare literary talent. Hope Lange is the sympathetic psychiatrist who tries to help him while Tuesday Weld and Millie Perkins round out an all-star cast as his seductive cousin and childhood sweetheart. This is Elvis at his untamed bad-boy best!
Otto Preminger's sprawling Second World War drama, In Harm's Way, packs a lot in its 165 minutes, beginning with the attack on Pearl Harbor (which Preminger re-creates in amazing detail) and ending a couple of years later with America's return to the South Pacific in force. John Wayne and Kirk Douglas star as a career naval captain and his self-pitying commander in the peacetime navy who are thrust into battle when Pearl Harbour is bombed while they are on manoeuvres. Minutes into World War II, they are already scapegoated and demoted by the embarrassed military brass. Wayne romances a WAVE nurse (Patricia Neal) and attempts a reconciliation with his estranged, spoiled son (Brandon de Wilde) while Douglas sinks into the bottle after the death of his cheating wife until the American fleet rebuilds and calls upon Wayne to lead one of the initial invasion forces. Henry Fonda makes a brief but commanding appearance as the fleet admiral. Burgess Meredith is a former writer turned witty commander, Dana Andrews a showy but indecisive admiral, and Stanley Holloway a genial Australian scout working with the American invasion forces. Tom Tryon and Paula Prentiss play newlyweds torn apart by the war, and also appearing are Franchot Tone, Carroll O'Conner, Slim Pickens, George Kennedy, Bruce Cabot, and Larry Hagman, among many, many more. Loyal Griggs's handsome black-and-white photography is topped only by Saul Bass's impressive closing credits sequence, a rising cascade of crashing waves and rough surf reportedly paced to mirror the dramatic rhythm of the film. --Sean Axmaker
The Revenge of Frankenstein was an inevitability after Hammer Films had made an international star of Peter Cushing in The Curse of this sequel-rich franchise. The plot here is a braver twist on the story than the many follow-ups would take. The Creature doesn't make its presence known until the final reel, up to which point the only sense of lurking menace comes from Cushing's deliciously mannered performance as a disguised Dr Stein. A new name and a new town is a gamble sure to fail, and circumstances almost immediately conspire against the deceit. Also rattling around the brilliantly lit studio sets are Eunice Gayson and Francis Matthews, while Michael Gwynn gives everything he's got in stiff competition to predecessor Christopher Lee in the Creature role. It's subtle and simply screams out for enfranchisement--so of course Hammer dutifully made another five in the series. On the DVD: The Revenge of Frankenstein comes with mono sound (all you're going to get from Hammer and 1958), but the 1.66:1 ratio is a treat. You also get a trailer (and a surprise additional movie trailer) plus 10 photos. --Paul Tonks
When Inspector Morse first appeared on television in 1987, nobody could have predicted that it would run into the next century, maintaining throughout a quality of scripts and story lines that raised the genre of the detective series to a new level. Much of its success can be attributed to John Thaw's total immersion in the role. Morse is a prickly character and not obviously easy to like. As a detective in Oxford with unfulfilled academic propensities, he is permanently excluded from a world of which he would dearly love to be a part. He is at odds with that world--and with his colleagues in the police force--most of the time. Passionate about opera and "proper beer", he is a cultural snob for whom vulgarity causes almost physical pain. As a result, he lives from one disillusionment to another. And he is scarred--more deeply than he would ever admit--by past relationships. But he also has a naïve streak and, deep-down sensitivity, which makes him a fascinating challenge for women. At the heart of Morse's professional life is his awkward partnership with Detective Sergeant Lewis, the resolutely ordinary, worldly sidekick who manages to keep his boss in an almost permanent state of exasperation while retaining his grudging respect. It's a testament to Kevin Whateley's consistently excellent performance that from such unpromising material, Lewis becomes as indispensable to the series as Barrington Pheloung's hypnotic, classic theme music. Morse's investigations do occasionally take him abroad to more exotic locations, but throughout 14 successful years of often gruesome murders, the city of Oxford itself became a central character in these brooding two-hour dramas: creator Colin Dexter stating he finally had to kill Morse off because he was giving Oxford a bad reputation as a dangerous place! --Piers Ford
The 1947 classic now in colour! Discover that miracles really do happen with one of the most spellbinding Christmas classic tales of all time. When Kris Kringle is hired to be Santa Claus in a department store's 34th Street branch his success is overwhelming much to the disdain of a rival store. When their attempts to discredit Santa take hold threatening all that is sacred and magical about Christmas prepare to find out that miracles really do happen...
In Malham Bridge former socialite and feisty pensioner Isobel Hewitt is accused of assault by fellow fly fisher Margaret Seagrove. When Barnaby and Troy investigate the allegations they discover that all is not well on the Midsomer riverbanks. The investigation takes a more serious turn when two bodies are discovered in the river. Are they the victims of an uncalculated attack by poachers or was there a more sinister motive?
This is the classic 1951 adaptation of Thomas Hughes's novel set at Rugby school in Victorian times. It tells the story of new boy Tom Brown his friednship with 'Scud' East and their battles with the school bully Flashman
The fourth season of classic American soap opera Dynasty.
British comedy adaptated from the play by Joe Orton. Two bank robbers, Dennis (Hywel Bennett) and Hal (Roy Holder), are on the run from the police after a successful heist. Needing somewhere to hide the loot, they turn to a funeral parlour where they can stash the cash in Hal's recently-deceased mother's coffin. Taking the coffin, they turn to Hal's father (Milo O'Shea) and hide it in the bathroom of his hotel. Before long the hotel is host to the eccentric Inspector Truscott (Richard Attenborough) as he traces the crooks, and the promiscuous nurse Fay (Lee Remick), who is also on the trail of the stolen money.
Capote (Dir. Bennett Miller ): In November 1959 the shocking murder of a smalltown Kansas family captures the imagination of Truman Capote (Philip Seymour Hoffman) famed author of Breakfast at Tiffany's. With his childhood friend Harper Lee (Catherine Keener) writer of the soon-to-be published To Kill a Mockingbird Capote sets out to investigate winning over the locals despite his flamboyant appearance and style. When he forms a bond with the killers and their execution date nears the writing of In Cold Blood a book that will change the course of American Literature takes a drastic toll on Capote changing him in ways he never imagined. In Cold Blood (Dir. Richard Brooks 1967): Richard Brooks' stylish and powerful 1967 drama adapted from Truman Capote's novel about a shocking real-life murder case. This daring cinematic portrait employs flashbacks to fully examine what drives an individual to commit thoughtless and brutal crimes while using a highly innovative jazz score by Quincy Jones to capture the moody atmosphere. A prosperous and respected Kansas farmer his wife and his two teenage children are wantonly and brutally slaughtered. The murderers are two mindless ex-convict drifters. Neither man is sane enough to regret their crime. The story penetrates the inner workings of the criminals' minds as it follows their purposeless meandering through Mexico and the United States in evasion of the law...
Fresh from Stuart Little, young Jonathan Lipnicki carries on his pint-sized shoulders his every scene in The Little Vampire as eight-year-old Tony, befriender of vampires. The Scottish setting lends itself nicely to spookiness, too. A continent away from his native California, Tony's having a tough time making new friends when a band of vagabond vampires enters his life through his bedroom window. The encounter seems pure coincidence at first, but then the scary truth surfaces: Tony, though he's not a vampire himself, has "sympathy for our kind", as the dad of the bat-linked brood puts it. Visions of vampire happenings from generations past invade the kid's consciousness, and they hold the key to the clan's current gypsy-like predicament. Through his clairvoyance and, by extension, the discovery of a long-lost amulet, the mostly benevolent bloodsuckers are able to reclaim their rightful status as proper cave-dwellers in their homeland. Clueless-parent predicaments abound--Tony's mum and dad smirk at their son's vampire-obsessed imagination until the cape-draped heads of the clan drop by for a visit--and viewers of around Tony's age will find the gang's adventures eluding a bumbling vampire hunter genuinely chuckle worthy. --Tammy La Gorce
When rock musician Warren Zevon was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given only months to live he decided to write and record what would be his last album the critically acclaimed THE WIND. Zevon also allowed a VH1 crew to film the album recording sessions footage of which became a moving episode of VH1's documentary series Inside/Out. This release features the VH1 special in its entirety capturing Zevon in his final act of artistic endeavor along with friends and colleagues Bru
Trailer Park Boys is a popular Canadian mockumentary television series focusing on the misadventures of Julian (John Paul Tremblay) and Ricky (Robb Wells). After 18 months in jail Julian and Ricky head back to Sunnyvale trailer park. They're aiming to get their lives together but wherever they go trouble is not far behind!
Roundly dismissed as one of Steven Spielberg's least successful efforts, this very underrated film poignantly follows the World War II adventures of young Jim (a brilliant Christian Bale), caught in the throes of the fall of China. What if you once had everything and lost it all in an afternoon? What if you were only 12 years old at the time? Bale's transformation, from pampered British ruling-class child to an imprisoned, desperate, nearly feral boy, is nothing short of stunning. Also stunning are exceptional sets, cinematography and music (the last courtesy of John Williams) that enhance author J.G. Ballard's and screenwriter Tom Stoppard's depiction of another, less familiar casualty of war. In a time when competitors were releasing "comedic", derivative coming-of-age films, Empire of the Sun stands out as an epic in the classic David Lean sense--despite confusion or perceived competition with the equally excellent The Last Emperor (also released in 1987, and also a coming-of-age in a similar setting). It is also a remarkable testament to, yes, the human spirit. And despite its disappointing box-office returns, Empire of the Sun helped to further establish Spielberg as more than a commercial director and set the standard, tone and look for future efforts Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan. --N.F. Mendoza
Nanking tells the story of the rape of Nanking one of the most tragic events in history. In 1937 the invading Japanese army murdered over 200 000 and raped tens of thousands of Chinese. In the midst of the horror a small group of Western expatriates banded together to save 250 000 -- an act of extraordinary heroism. Bringing an event little-known outside of Asia to a global audience Nanking shows the tremendous impact individuals can make on the course of history. It is a gripping account of light in the darkest of times.
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