The stakes are higher than ever for Adam Harry and the team as growing mistrust between the British American and Iranian Governments culminates in a series of high-risk operations at home pushing the Section to its very limits. As Iran`s race to become a nuclear power impacts on British and American security the distinction between friend and foe becomes ever more blurred.
The Titanic
In 1975's Carry On England, a mixed-sex anti-aircraft battery is set up during World War II by way of an experiment. The sex is indeed pretty mixed, although the drafting in of Patrick Mower and Judy Geeson rather demonstrates the need for at least some of the cast to be attractive in order to make this odd premise feasible. For the most part, of course, it's tits-out sex-comedy slapstick all the way, but there's a nicely ambivalent performance from Kenneth Connor, who portrays the wartime British officer class as being pretty much bonkers, a telling interpretation, which Stephen Fry was to perfect years later in Blackadder Goes Forth. The location is of course typically Carry On cheap-and-cheerful, but its inevitable drabness, together with the indistinguishable khaki uniforms, tends to put a bit of a dampener on the adult-panto atmosphere that the best Carry Ons deliver. The cast commendably manage to transcend this, though, so there's still plenty of fun to be had. --Roger Thomas
The Rag Trade: LWT Series 1 (2 Discs)
Tom Cruise uncovers his dark side to play a contract killer who hijacks a taxi - and its driver - to take him from job to job.
The classic tale of Tom Jones a boy who is adopted in childhood by the kindly Squire Allworthy adapted from the novel written by Henry Fielding. As a result he becomes a privileged gentleman but one with a roving eye. Soon an amorous indiscretion results in him being exiled from his home...
This box set features the entire first series of the classic British Television drama Inspector Morse. Episodes comprise: 1. The Dead of Jericho: Morse who never quite finds romance thinks that at last things will turn out differently when he meets beautiful Anne Stavely (Gemma Jones). But it is a love destined not to be when Anne is found hanging from a beam in mysterious circumstances. Morse suspects murder and sets out to discover the truth. Joining him is Serg
After the death of her bullying husband the not-so aged and downtrodden housewife Thelma Caldicot (Pauline Collins) is shipped off to the Twilight Years Rest Home by her money-grabbing son and manipulative daughter in-law. Appalled by the conditions Mrs Caldicot decides to taker matters into her own hands...
From acclaimed children's television writer and presenter Paul Hutchins comes Titch. Eager for new experiences Titch always tries to help out as much as he can. He tries to do the things that the big people do but as his faithful cat Tallcat finds out his help can sometimes cause chaos. Despite these mini-disastersTitch always remains loveable. Episodes comprise: 1. The Picnic 2. Spaceman Titch 3. Sleeping Beauty 4. Camp Fire 5. Titch Was Little 6. The
When a doctor is killed at a mental asylum the evil Baron Frankenstein seizes the chance to transplant his brain into the meek body of Doctor Richter. But the bloody operation creates an entity of evil which shatters the lives of everyone...
Cy Endfield cowrote the epic prequel Zulu Dawn 15 years after his enormously popular Zulu. Set in 1879, this film depicts the catastrophic Battle of Isandhlwana, which remains the worst defeat of the British army by natives--the British contingent was outnumbered 16-to-1 by the Zulu tribesmen. The film's opinion of events is made immediately clear in its title sequence: ebullient African village life presided over by King Cetshwayo is contrasted with aristocratic artifice under the arrogant eye of General Lord Chelmsford (Peter O'Toole). Chelmsford is at the heart of all that goes wrong, initiating the catastrophic battle with an ultimatum made seemingly for the sake of giving his troops something to do. His detached manner leads to one mistake after another and this is wryly illustrated in a moment when neither he nor his officers can be bothered to pronounce the name of the land they're in. That it's a beautiful land none the less is made clear by the superb cinematography, which drinks in the massive open spaces that shrink the British army to a line of red ants. Splendidly stiff-upper-lipped support comes from a heroic Burt Lancaster and a fluffy, yet gruff, Bob Hoskins. Although the story is less focused and inevitably more diffuse than the concentrated events of Rorke's Drift that followed soon after, Zulu Dawn is an unflinchingly honest depiction of British Imperial diplomacy. --Paul Tonks
The hit of the 1969-1970 season, Department S was an attempt on the part of television company ITC to create a "with-it" follow-up to the The Saint and Man in a Suitcase series which were starting to look staid by then. The department of the title is notionally part of Interpol, a group managed by the first of many black TV top cops (here Denis Albana Peters), and assigned all the bizarre cases The Avengers hadn't handled. Often they would come up against modern variations on the classic "locked-room" or "paradox" mysteries so favoured in crime fiction, mysteries which verge on the sort of phenomena The X Files would later specialise in (except no aliens appear in Department S). The supposed leads are Action-Man-type Stewart Sullivan (Joel Fabiani) and English-rose computer whiz Annabelle Hurst (Rosemary Nichols), but the break-out character is the flamboyant Jason King (Peter Wyngarde), a mystery writer and puzzle-solver notable for his Fu Manchu facial hair and an enormous wardrobe of safari suits, ruffled shirts, flared trousers and velvet jackets. King was the only male character on TV to be as fashion-conscious as the Avengers girls, and his preening peacock attitudes--along with the scripts' above-average mysteries--made this essential viewing for the Age of Aquarius. Volume One includes the following episodes: "Six Days", in which a missing airliner turns up but the passengers have no idea that they've lost six days, with Peter Bowles; and "The Trojan Tanker", in which a mystery woman is found in a luxury suite concealed inside an oil tanker, with Simon (Doomwatch) Oates. --Kim Newman
Based upon harrowing real events which were turned in to a 1955 novel by Jean-Paul Clébert, The Blockhouse starts explosively with an Allied air raid on a Nazi prison camp. Six escaped prisoners take shelter in an underground blockhouse, which is soon destroyed by heavy shelling. Trapped underground, with an almost endless supply of food, wine and candles, the men must endure confinement with no prospect of escape or rescue. Featuring a stunning ensemble cast that includes Peter Sellers (Hoffman), Charles Aznavour (Shoot the Pianist), Peter Vaughan (Symptoms), Jeremy Kemp (The Strange Affair), Per Oscarsson (A Dandy in Aspic) and Leon Lissek (Marat/Sade), The Blockhouse was filmed on the Channel Islands in a horribly dank and dark underground bunker, giving the film a suffocating sense of claustrophobia. This new restoration edition marks the film's worldwide Blu-ray premiere.
Norman Wisdom reprises his famous Pitkin character for the third time in A Stitch in Time, and Edward Chapman is also back to provide Norman with the excuse to reprise his immortal catch-phrase "Mr Grimsdale!". Here he succeeds in causing chaos in a St John Ambulance unit, as well as donning drag to play a blonde nurse complete with suspender belt and silk stockings. Each Norman Wisdom movie usually sees him as the accidental Lord of Misrule in one institution or another, and this time it's the NHS: after being banned from his local hospital, Norman resorts to subterfuge to visit a little orphan girl. There's an autobiographical touch here, as Wisdom himself was raised in an orphanage and centred the plot of One Good Turn (1954) around such an establishment. --Gary S Dalkin An important step in the career of Norman Wisdom, Just My Luck is principally notable for the introduction of actor Edward Chapman, whom many would come to know as series regular Mr Grimsdale. Here he's the stuffy foil to Norman's romantic plans regarding his jewel-making job, where he'll do anything to possess some of the wealth about him. The chance comes in the form of an accumulator bet at Goodwood races thanks to a slimy Leslie Phillips. Another star cameo of note was a second appearance by Margaret Rutherford (after Trouble in Store) as an eccentric animal owner. But the real advance with the Wisdom formula was that--after a reasonably serious plot line--Norman finally gets the girl. --Paul Tonks
Michael York stars as a fictional British prince who fall in love with a beautiful Japanese tour guide in this sumptuous romantic adventure of 1977. Directed and produced by Oscar-nominated Lewis Gilbert - whose career spans six decades and iconic British films such as Alfie You Only Live Twice and Shirley Valentine - Seven Nights in Japan is presented here in a brand-new transfer from the original film elements in its as-exhibited theatrical aspect ratio. Handsome Prince George arrives on board his ship in Japan. Youthful immaculate in naval uniform and smiling broadly he goes through the complicated formalities of being greeted by a host nation. But housed with the Ambassador and his family the Prince finds the atmosphere stuffy and dull; he longs for freedom and for once rebels against his upbringing with all its constraints and responsibilities escaping for a week of romance and unexpected drama... Special Features: Original Theatrical Trailer Image Gallery Original Pressbook PDF
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
Remembered dimly as Peter Sellers' only venture into "serious" acting, Never Let Go has a lot of other things to recommend it, mostly because it manages to include a lot of the lurid elements that gained it an X certificate in 1960. It has a near-demented melodrama plot, as two desperate obsessives collide in a bizarre feud. Richard Todd, doing meek and put-upon, is a sales rep for smug Peter Jones' cosmetics firm whose life is turned upside-down when his Ford Anglia, bought on hire purchase and uninsured, is stolen by teddy boy Adam Faith. Looking like an inhabitant of Royston Vasey in The League of Gentlemen, Sellers plays a grinning, jumped-up spiv who runs a legitimate garage which is a front for the car thieves and is sugar daddy to teenage tartlet Carol White. Typical of Sellers' demonic rottenness is a scene in which he breaks down-and-out Melvyn Johns' heart by stamping on his beloved terrapin. "Peanut" Todd's crusade to get back his motor (catchphrase "what about my car?") brings trouble too: he gets repeatedly beaten up, abandoned by his wife (Elizabeth Sellars) and dragged to the edge of madness for a final punch-up in a garage. With a delightfully sleazy, jazzy John Barry score, lots of local colour in the caffs and gaffs of criminal London circa 1960 and a parade of welcome character actors (John le Mesurier, David Lodge, Noel Willman, Nigel Stock), this has its soapy spells, but it's a fascinating relic. On the DVD: Never Let Go's menu plays under Faith's theme song ("When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again--Oh Yeah Oh Yeah!"). The print is slightly letterboxed but looks a few generations away from the master with some careless transfer work that greys shadows and overexposes some scenes. --Kim Newman
Who Watches the Watchers? MI5. The Spooks. They don't exist. You will never know their names where they come from who they are. And they're all that stand between you and those who watch this country with terror on their minds. This release features all the episodes from the first six series.
St. Patrick's Day in Dublin City; this means trouble everywhere. Between The Canals follows three small time criminals from Dublin's North Inner City: Two are happy with their lot as drug users and thugs, but Liam is looking for a way out. He wants to quit his life of crime, get a job and provide for his girlfriend and son. He just has to get through this one day and maybe things will look brighter for him. A hilarious and occasionally heartbreaking story of loyalty, duty and masculinity. Special Features: Interview with Director and Writer Mark O'Connor. Song by Robert Delaney
Inspector Morse provides all the period cosiness of an Agatha Christie costume drama but in an apparently modern setting. Morse is a contemporary detective with all the nostalgic appeal of Poirot or Sherlock Holmes, an anachronistic throwback who drives a classic car, listens to Wagner on LP, quaffs real ale in country pubs or single malt at home and quotes poetry whenever occasion arises (at least once or twice an episode). His much put-upon sidekick Segeant Lewis (Kevin Whateley) is the bemused ordinary copper who acts as a foil for his artistic and academic passions, and not incidentally allows the writers to explain any possibly obscure or learned references to the TV audience. With plots of crossword puzzle-like intricacy, top-drawer thespian guest stars, loving views of quintessentially English Tourist Board Oxfordshire countryside and literate screenplays from such luminaries as Malcom Bradbury, the show was a sure-fire hit across middle England.In 1994, after four successful series, John Thaw moved on to other projects (initially, the disastrous A Year In Provence) but always left the door open for more Morse. "The Remorseful Day" is, however, positively his final appearance. The story opens dramatically with a montage of kinky sex and murder, before settling down into a leisurely exploration of leads that might or might not be red herrings. More murders follow, naturally, as the story adds yet more twists. But this time things are different: Morse, on the very eve of retirement, is gravely ill. Convalescing at home he consoles himself with bird watching and a newly acquired CD player, but he is more than usually irritable and relations with Lewis, who is impatiently awaiting his own promotion to Inspector, are strained. Could Morse himself be the murderer? Certainly Chief Superintendent Strange (James Grout) is worried. The ultimate resolution of the case takes second place to the show's finale, which will be no surprise to anyone who has read Colin Dexter's novel. A poignant and dignified end to the casebook of a much-loved detective.On the DVD: This disc also includes a 96-minute appreciation of the Morse phenomenon, "Rest in Peace", presented by James Grout who plays Chief Superintendent Strange in the series, plus a music video of the Morse theme tune, "Yesterday is Here". --Mark Walker
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