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Robert Wynne-Simmons’s The Outcasts is a haunting and ultimately melancholy study of social ostracization and rebellion that takes place in rural Ireland sometime before the potato famine of 1845. The film felicitously combines an almost documentarian concern for the folkways of the peasants who till the muddy earth and the delicately wrought magical elements found in an Irish folk tale.

Pensive and taciturn Maura O’Donnell (Mary Ryan) is lame in one leg, and thus the target of bullying from the village children. Her two sisters have little interest in coming to her defense. Breda (Brenda Scallon) is a widow mostly preoccupied by taking care of their wayward father, Hugh (Dan Foley), while Janey (Bairbre Ní Chaoimh) has found herself in a family way thanks to local boy Eamon (Máirtín Jaimsie), who’s more interested in taking over the O’Donnell farm than starting a family.

Village relations seem timeless somehow,...

Courtesy of Eureka Entertainment

by James Cameron-wilson

Perhaps surprisingly, Juggernaut is being released on Blu-ray for the first time in the United Kingdom, from a high-definition restoration, to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. When Juggernaut was first released in cinemas in 1974, it was at the height of the disaster movie era, following on from The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and, in the same year, Airport 1975, Earthquake and The Towering Inferno, all stories featuring numerous sundry characters trapped together in terrifying circumstances. However, Juggernaut was a very different thing, both in its execution and in its presentation. Loosely inspired by the bomb hoax on board the QE2 luxury liner in 1972, the film was originally to have been directed by Bryan Forbes. However, when Forbes jumped ship, he was replaced by the American TV director Don Medford, who also left the project at the last minute, leaving the production company with the enormous daily...

Courtesy of Studiocanal

by James Cameron-wilson

Hard to believe today, but Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s 1949 drama was a flop. A glum, perhaps cynical, claustrophobic piece of film noir shot in black-and-white, The Small Back Room was released just four years after the end of the Second World War – and it was not what postwar audiences wanted to see. Indeed, it is hardly one of the most celebrated titles in the Powell/Pressburger catalogue and I, for one, had never seen it before. Even so, having just watched this consummately photographed and magically restored work, I would say without hesitation it is one of my very favourite Powell and Pressburger films.

With the psychological complexity of a good play and replete with telling touches, it blends both the disciplines of Hollywood film noir with the Expressionism of the Weimar cinema of Germany, but with its own ineffable, stiff upper lip Englishness.

Two further lost British sitcom episodes have been discovered via the BFI’s Missing Believed Wiped initiative. Here are the details.

Thanks to the hard work of the BFI, it’s an incredible time to be a fan of vintage British comedy.

In the last few months, the entire series of The Complete And Utter History of Britain and episodes of Til Death Us Do Part, Hugh and I and Sykes and a… have been found.

We can now add two more to the list, according to the British Comedy Guide. The first is the fifth episode of 1964 series Lance At Large, the first sitcom by The Fall And Rise Of Reginald Perrin writer David Nobbs.

Previously thought entirely wiped, the show was written by Nobbs and Peter Tinniswood, and starred Lance Percival and Bernard Spear. The recovered episode also features guest stars Fred Emney, Hugh Paddick and Diana Chappell.

This lesser-known suspense thriller is an excellent adaptation of a novel by Graham Greene, and a fine showcase for actor Anthony Hopkins and the upcoming Kristin Scott Thomas, with an able assist from Derek Jacobi. A Paris lawyer is sentenced to die as a random hostage of the German occupiers, but swaps with another prisoner with a desperate, questionable death-cell contract. Three years later, he must pretend not to be himself when he returns to the house he traded for his life, to face a woman who has sworn to kill the man who allowed her brother to die. Fans of Hannibal Lecter will be impressed by Hopkins’ deep, absorbing performance — the show’s moral tension and strange twists of fate are quite moving.

The Tenth Man

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1988 / Color / 2:35 1:85 1:66 widescreen 1:37 Academy / 99 min. / Street Date August 30, 2022 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Kristin Scott Thomas,...

Welcome to Ground Zero for ‘Committed Cinema’ Italian style. Director Giuiano Montaldo filmed his dream project on location in Ireland and a bit in Boston, with top stars Gian Maria Volontè and Riccardo Cucciolla. In one of the highest-profile American ‘media’ trials ever the famed immigrants Sacco and Vanzetti were tried for a crime but convicted by politics: even the judge asserted they were guilty by definition. Montaldo shows how wrongly justice can be served without whitewashing the defendants. UK actors Cyril Cusack and Milo O’Shea up the performance level, and the Ennio Morricone / Joan Baez songs have kept the film alive.

Sacco & Vanzetti

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1971 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 125 min. / Street Date May 3, 2022 / Sacco e Vanzetti; Intolerance (shooting title?) / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Gian Maria Volontè, Riccardo Cucciolla, Cyril Cusack, Rosanna Fratello, Geoffrey Keen, Milo O’Shea, William Prince, Claude Mann, Edward Jewesbury, Armenia Balducci, Valentino Orfeo,...

Fierce Irish rebels go head-to-head with Brit occupation forces, and James Cagney is first on the barricades. Michael Anderson’s thriller about terror violence in 1921 Dublin has suspense, beautiful cinematography in real Irish locations, and a standout cast: Don Murray, Glynis Johns, Dana Wynter, Michael Redgrave, Cyril Cusack and Sybil Thorndike — plus added-value players Richard Harris, Donal Donnelly and Niall MacGinness. Cagney’s surgeon-turned guerilla doesn’t yell “Top of the World!” but he’s as psychotic as Cody Jarrett: he wants to shoot both the leading ladies. Included is a good interview with Don Murray.

Shake Hands with the Devil

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1959 / Color B&w / 1:66 widescreen/ 111 min. / Street Date January 4, 2022 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: James Cagney, Don Murray, Dana Wynter, Glynis Johns, Michael Redgrave, Sybil Thorndike, Cyril Cusack, Marianne Benet, Robert Brown, John Cairney, Harry H. Corbett, Eileen Crowe, Allan Cuthbertson, Donal Donnelly, Richard Harris,...

Out of the myriad mavericks and miscreants that populate the poliziotteschi—a genre of Italian crime films that flourished locally from the late 1960s to the early 1980s and subsequently attained cult status thanks in large part to the advocacy of filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino and publications like Nocturno Cinema—Luca Canali of The Italian Connection (1972) is among those most destined for immortality.Incarnated by Mario Adorf, Luca exudes unruliness the moment he appears on screen. Bedecked with greased-back hair, gaudy suits, and a thick build, Luca manifests not so much slickness (or a certain ideal thereof) as a fumbling attempt at it, a performance of wealth and prestige that feels tenuous on account of its excesses. Despite his initially jaunty demeanor, Luca projects a vague sense of social precarity, an impression enhanced by various characters verbally demeaning him as a “nobody” compared to more “respectable” figures in the community.

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“The Archers Vs. Selznick = 2 Movies In 1”

By Raymond Benson

Here’s an interesting lesson in filmmaking. Students of the art might learn something by watching the two different cuts of this motion picture to see what happens when a movie is edited down—especially when the original was made by bona fide artists as opposed to a slick Hollywood producer who, albeit successful, might not know everything.

David O. Selznick was a powerhouse producer and head of his own personal studio. “The Archers” were a unique British directing/writing/producing team and production company that consisted of the brilliant Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, who, for a solid decade, delivered some of the most engaging and beautifully-rendered works of cinematic art in the 20th Century. It is true that Powell and Pressburger were perhaps not as appreciated during their time as they should have been,...

1984, the seminal dystopian novel by English novelist George Orwell, remains one of the most iconic literary works of all time, with themes and motifs from the story destined to forever thread through both the real world and works of fiction. Well, it looks like Hollywood is going back to the well, as Mattson Tomlin, currently known for his work on Matt Reeves' upcoming The Batman movie starring Robert Pattinson, is now working on 2084/">2084, a new movie being developed at Paramount Pictures.

2084 is being described as a "spiritual sister" to George Orwell's 1984-1956/">1984, which follows a man named Winston Smith as he wrestles with oppression in Oceania, a place where the Party scrutinizes human actions with ever-watchful Big Brother. Plot details on this upcoming sort-of-sequel are being tightly guarded, but one can presume that it will follow similar themes of oppression, rebellion, as well as political and societal control.

Lorenzo di Bonaventura...

Classic cinematics from first-rank filmmakers. No ballet or heroism, so not a crowd pleaser, but Michael Powell’s original version of Gone to Earth is another unique Archers creation. Jennifer Jones finally gets to chew on a character role with grit, as a natural virgin/vixen misunderstood by contrasting suitors. David O. Selznick’s revision The Wild Heart is a classic too — of unnecessary meddling.

Gone to Earth / The Wild Heart

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1950 / Color / 1:37 flat Academy / 110, 86 min. / Street Date June 25, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Jennifer Jones, David Farrar, Cyril Cusack, Sybil Thorndike, Edward Chapman, Esmond Knight, Hugh Griffith.

Cinematography: Christopher Challis

Film Editor: Reginald Mills

From the novel by: Mary Webb

Music by Brian Easdale

Written, Produced and Directed by Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger

This is one beautiful production, one that will thrill Powell & Pressburger fans eager to see all of his films. With his typical cinematic simplicity,...

“A Pint Of British Noir”

By Raymond Benson

Film noir wasn’t just relegated to American Hollywood films of the forties and fifties. It was something of an international movement, albeit an unconscious one, for it wasn’t until the late fifties that some critics in France looked back at the past two decades of crime pictures and proclaimed, “Oui! Film noir!”

Britain was doing it, too. Carol Reed’s 1947 Ira-thriller-that-isn’t-an-ira-thriller Odd Man Out is one of the best examples of the style. Robert Krasker’s black and white cinematography pulls in all the essential film noir elements—German expressionism, high contrasts between dark and light, and tons of shadows. Other noir trappings are present, such as stormy weather, night scenes, exterior locations, bars, shabby tenements, a lot of smoking, and a crime. And, for a movie to be “pure noir,” there must not be a happy ending. Odd...

Fred Zinnemann’s counter-assassination thriller remains topflight filmmaking, torn from reality and shot through with an unsentimental dose of political realism. Edward Fox’s implacable killer outwits the combined resources of an entire nation as he stalks his prey, and when bad luck forces him to improvise, he racks up more victims on his kill list. Step aside Bond, Bourne and Marvel — the original Jackal is the man to beat.

The Day of the Jackal

Blu-ray

Arrow Video USA

1973 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 143 min. / Street Date September 25, 2018 / Available from Arrow Video / 39.95

Starring: Edward Fox, Michel Lonsdale, Delphine Seyrig, Cyril Cusack, Eric Porter, Tony Britton, Alan Badel, Michel Auclair, Tony Britton, Maurice Denham, Vernon Dobtcheff, Olga Georges-Picot, Timothy West, Derek Jacobi, Jean Martin, Ronald Pickup, Jean Sorel, Philippe Léotard, Jean Champion, Michel Subor, Howard Vernon.

Cinematography: Jean Tournier

Film Editor: Ralph Kemplen

Second Unit Director: Andrew Marton

Original Music: Georges Delerue

Written...

Red hot off of Marvel’s Black Panther, the on fire Michael B. Jordan still wants to burn it all. This time Jordan wants to set fire in the first look teaser for HBO‘s upcoming Fahrenheit 451. The film is based of off the Ray Bradbury 1953 novel of the same name which deals with censorship in the future where firemen have orders to set fire to every book.

Michael B. Jordan plays the lead role of Montag, a fireman that struggles with censorship and his mentor and opposite Captain Betty, played by Michael Shannon.

The novel was originally adapted to film in 1966 in the British version which starred Oskar Werner, Cyril Cusack and Julie Christie in the lead roles.

Fahrenheit 451 is set to air on HBO in Spring of this year and is directed by Ramin Bahrani and also stars Sofia Boutella (Atomic Blonde), Keir Dullea (2001: A...

HBO has released the first teaser for their movie based on the gripping book by Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451!  Watch Michael B. Jordan burn it all down within...

This Spring, HBO is bringing the heat with their film, Fahrenheit 451.  The film, based on Ray Bradbury's 1953 classic, stars Michael B. Jordan and Michael Shannon as two "Firemen" in a future where books have been outlawed and must be burned.  Jordan plays the lead character, Guy Montag, who starts to rethink his actions and that of his mentor Captain Beatty, played by Shannon.

Bradbury's novel has been regarded as one of his best writings, but it's also his most intense.  If this initial teaser is any indication for what we're in store for, it looks like it'll do Bradbury's tale justice.

This may be the first time HBO has taken a crack at Fahrenheit 451, but it's not the first time this...

One of the best international thrillers ever has almost become an obscurity, for reasons unknown – this Blu-ray comes from Australia. Edward Fox’s wily assassin for hire goes up against the combined police and security establishments of three nations as he sets up the killing of a head of state – France’s president Charles de Gaulle. The terrific cast features Michel Lonsdale, Delphine Seyrig and Cyril Cusack; director Fred Zinnemann’s excellent direction reaches a high pitch of tension – even though the outcome is known from the start.

The Day of the Jackal

Region B+A Blu-ray

Shock Entertainment / Universal

1973 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 143 min. / Street Date ? / Available from Amazon UK / Pounds 19.99

Starring: Edward Fox, Michel Lonsdale, Delphine Seyrig, Cyril Cusack, Eric Porter, Tony Britton, Alan Badel, Michel Auclair, Tony Britton, Maurice Denham, Vernon Dobtcheff, Olga Georges-Picot, Timothy West, Derek Jacobi, Jean Martin, Ronald Pickup, Jean Sorel, Philippe Léotard, Jean Champion,...

François Truffaut’s adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s dystopian, illiterate future looks better than ever, but the scary part is that some of its oddest sci-fi extrapolations seem to be coming true. It’s a movie that truly grows on one. The Bernard Herrmann music score is one of the composer’s very best.

Fahrenheit 451

Blu-ray

Universal Studios Home Entertainment

1966 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 112 min. / 50th Anniversary Edition / Street Date June 6, 2017 / $14.98

Starring Julie Christie, Oskar Werner, Cyril Cusack, Anton Diffring, Jeremy Spencer, Bee Duffell.

Cinematography: Nicolas Roeg

Production Designers: Syd Cain, Tony Walton

Film Editor: Thom Noble

Original Music: Bernard Herrmann

Written by François Truffaut & Jean-Louis Richard from the book by Ray Bradbury

Produced by Lewis M. Allen, Miriam Brickman

Directed by François Truffaut

Quality science fiction was once a hard sell with both critics and the public. Fahrenheit 451 is usually discussed either as a Science Fiction film or a François Truffaut movie,...

Alex Westthorp Sep 14, 2016

Did fantasy dramas Chocky, The Box Of Delights and Dramarama leave an impression on you as a kid? Revisit those nightmares here...

Spooky, always magical and occasionally downright scary dramas are the bedrock of kids' television. For me, the pinnacle of this sort of programme was reached in the 1980s. The decade saw a new approach to both traditional and contemporary drama by both UK broadcasters: ITV committed itself to regular seasons of children's plays with Dramarama (1983-89), a kind of youth version of the venerable BBC Play For Today (1970-84), which saw the 1988 television debut of one David Tennant. The BBC, building upon an impressive body of work from the early 70s onwards, produced some of its very best family drama in this era, embracing cutting edge technology to bring treats like The Box Of Delights (1984) and The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe (1988) to the screen.

Where do I get my Big Brother campaign pin and yard poster? Michael Radford's elaborate Orwell adaptation sticks closely to the original book, even after decades of deriviative dystopias have stolen its fire. John Hurt is excellent as Winston Smith, and Richard Burton is his inquisitor. Nineteen Eighty-Four Blu-ray Twilight Time Limited Edition 1984 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 111 min. / Ship Date December 8, 2016 / available through Twilight Time Movies / 29.95 Starring John Hurt, Richard Burton, Suzanna Hamilton, Cyril Cusack, Gregor Fisher, James Walker, Phyllis Logan. Cinematography Roger Deakins Production Designer Allan Cameron Art Direction Martin Hebert, Grant Hicks Film Editor Tom Priestley Original Music (2) Dominick Muldowney / Eurythmics Written by Jonathan Gems, Michael Radford from the novel by George Orwell Produced by Al Clark, Robert Devereux, Simon Perry, Marvin J. Rosenblum Directed by Michael Radford

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

George Orwell's pessimistic 1948 novel 1984 is probably the most important political book of the last century.

Alfred Hitchcock, Cary Grant, and Ingrid Bergman: The 'Notorious' British (Hitchcock, Grant) and Swedish (Bergman) talent. British actors and directors in Hollywood; Hollywood actors and directors in Britain: Anthony Slide's 'A Special Relationship.' 'A Special Relationship' Q&A: Britain in Hollywood and Hollywood in Britain First of all, what made you think of a book on “the special relationship” between the American and British film industries – particularly on the British side? I was aware of a couple of books on the British in Hollywood, but I wanted to move beyond that somewhat limited discussion and document the whole British/American relationship as it applied to filmmaking. Growing up in England, I had always been interested in the history of the British cinema, but generally my writing on film history has been concentrated on America. I suppose to a certain extent I wanted to go back into my archives,...

Ron Moody in Mel Brooks' 'The Twelve Chairs.' The 'Doctor Who' that never was. Ron Moody: 'Doctor Who' was biggest professional regret (See previous post: "Ron Moody: From Charles Dickens to Walt Disney – But No Harry Potter.") Ron Moody was featured in about 50 television productions, both in the U.K. and the U.S., from the late 1950s to 2012. These included guest roles in the series The Avengers, Gunsmoke, Starsky and Hutch, Hart to Hart, and Murder She Wrote, in addition to leads in the short-lived U.S. sitcom Nobody's Perfect (1980), starring Moody as a Scotland Yard detective transferred to the San Francisco Police Department, and in the British fantasy Into the Labyrinth (1981), with Moody as the noble sorcerer Rothgo. Throughout the decades, he could also be spotted in several TV movies, among them:[1] David Copperfield (1969). As Uriah Heep in this disappointing all-star showcase distributed theatrically in some countries.

'Henry V' Movie Actress Renée Asherson dead at 99: Laurence Olivier leading lady in acclaimed 1944 film (image: Renée Asherson and Laurence Olivier in 'Henry V') Renée Asherson, a British stage actress featured in London productions of A Streetcar Named Desire and Three Sisters, but best known internationally as Laurence Olivier's leading lady in the 1944 film version of Henry V, died on October 30, 2014. Asherson was 99 years old. The exact cause of death hasn't been specified. She was born Dorothy Renée Ascherson (she would drop the "c" some time after becoming an actress) on May 19, 1915, in Kensington, London, to Jewish parents: businessman Charles Ascherson and his second wife, Dorothy Wiseman -- both of whom narrowly escaped spending their honeymoon aboard the Titanic. (Ascherson cancelled the voyage after suffering an attack of appendicitis.) According to Michael Coveney's The Guardian obit for the actress, Renée Asherson was "scantly...

Stars: Bud Cort, Ruth Gordon, Vivian Pickles, Cyril Cusack, Charles Tyner, Ellen Geer, Eric Christmas | Written by Colin Higgins | Directed by Hal Ashby

Harold (Cort) is young, rich, depressed, lonely and obsessed with death. His idea of fun is visiting funerals and pretending to commit suicide in a variety of gruesome and violent ways in front of his controlling mother. One day at a funeral he meets Maude (Gordon), a fun and rebellious seventy-nine year-old who loves life and every thing to do with it. As their friendship grows, Maude teaches Harold how to live life to the full with a smile on your face, how to love and to not worry so much about the little things.

Filmed in 1971, Harold and Maude is coming to Blu-ray this year as part of the Masters of Cinema series. This irreverent and dark comedy is a strange tale of loving life to the fullest.

Schoolgirl Zoë Smith was penning lucid movie reviews back in 1932, and when our veteran film critic retired, she sent him her work. He was so impressed, he drove to her home to meet her

A few months ago a rather special present arrived on my 80th birthday, my final day as film critic of the Observer. It was a small, lined notebook, seven by four-and-a half inches. On the first page was a drawing of the matinee idol Clive Brook under the title "Film Criticisms 1932". It had been sent from south London by the 97-year-old Zoë Di Biase. She'd been a regular Observer reader since the age of 18, she said, and this was a gift to mark my retirement. "I've always enjoyed the cinema and you were a great follow-on to CA Lejeune," she wrote, referring to my predecessor who was this paper's critic from 1928 to 1960. "Turning out the other day,...

Actor known for his roles as clergymen, favourite uncles and tragic-comic characters

There is a great tradition in the rotundity of actors, and Roger Hammond, who has died aged 76 of cancer, stands proudly in a line stretching from Francis L Sullivan and Willoughby Goddard through to Roy Kinnear, Desmond Barrit and Richard Griffiths, though he was probably more malleably benevolent on stage than any of them.

He reeked of kindness, consideration and imperturbability, with a pleasant countenance and a beautiful, soft voice, qualities ideal for unimpeachable clergymen, favourite uncles and tragic-comic characters such as Waffles in Chekhov's Uncle Vanya (whom he played in a 1991 BBC TV film, with David Warner and Ian Holm), a man whose wife left him for another man on his wedding day but who has remained faithful to her and forgiving ever since.

Hammond grew up in Stockport, Lancashire. His chartered accountant father was managing director of his own family firm,...

The science fiction world suffered a great loss with the death of the legendary Ray Bradbury, who departed this universe on June 5th 2012 at the age of 91. An incredible influence on the genre during the forties and fifties, Bradbury re-defined 20th Century American fiction with a prolific output that tackled a wide variety of subjects. But it was science fiction that he will be best remembered for. Most of his short stories and novels depicted a bleak utopian future ruled by media technology. This was made all the more unique by the fact that Bradbury never drove a car. His most famous works are The Illustrated Man, Fahrenheit 451 and The Martian Chronicles.

The family tree itself had one interesting skeleton in the cupboard. Bradbury’s ancestor was Mary Bradbury, who was tried as a witch during the infamous Salem Witch Trials of 1692. She was married to Massachusetts born Captain Thomas Bradbury.

By Allen Gardner

Harold And Maude (Criterion) Hal Ashby’s masterpiece of black humor centers on a wealthy young man (Bud Cort) who’s obsessed with death and the septuagenarian (Ruth Gordon) with whom he finds true love. As unabashedly romantic as it is quirky, with Cat Stevens supplying one of the great film scores of all-time. Fine support from Vivian Pickles, Cyril Cusack, Charles Tyner, and Ellen Geer. Fine screenplay by Colin Higgins. Also available on Blu-ray disc. Bonuses: Commentary by Hal Ashby biographer Nick Dawson, producer Charles Mulvehill; Illustrated audio excerpts from seminars by Ashby and Higgins; Interview with Cat Stevens. Widescreen. Dolby 2.0 stereo.

In Darkness (Sony) Agnieszka Holland’s Ww II epic tells the true story of a sewer worker and petty thief in Nazi-occupied Poland who single-handedly helped hide a group of Jews in the city’s labyrinthine sewer system for the duration of the war.

Brian Grazer and Ron Howard's Imagine Entertainment is planning a reboot of the George Orwell's classic totalitarian sci fi, Nineteen Eighty-Four.

The classic novel takes place in a dystopian society in a perpetual state of war, which in turn leads to a state of paranoia. It follows Winston Smith, who works for a government branch called the Ministry of Truth, where he alters facts and histories but secretly harbors desires of rebellion (as well as desires of a forbidden love affair).

This project is still in early development.

Nineteen Eighty-Four was released December 14th, 1984 and stars John Hurt, Richard Burton, Suzanna Hamilton, Cyril Cusack, Gregor Fisher, James Walker, Andrew Wilde, David Trevena. The film is directed by Michael Radford.

The distinctive and beguiling Irish actor David Kelly, who has died aged 82, was as familiar a face in British television sitcoms as he was on the stage in Dublin, where he was particularly associated with the Gate theatre. But he was perhaps best known in recent years for playing Grandpa Joe in Tim Burton's movie adaptation of Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005), an engaging performance that was honoured with a lifetime achievement award from the Irish Film and Television Academy; Johnny Depp, who played Willy Wonka, paid a touching tribute on a video link from Hollywood to Dublin.

Kelly was a tall and flamboyant figure who was often cast as a comic, eccentric Irishman, notably as Albert Riddle, an incompetent, one-armed dish-washer in the late 1970s British sitcom Robin's Nest; he...

I was looking forward to seeing Juggernaut on TCM not too long ago when I saw it show up on the classics channel’s schedule. Even in this cable/download/Netflix age of constant program recycling, the movie rarely shows up on TV, maybe because it had been such an instant and complete flop when released theatrically in 1974. Still, this UK-produced film has always been one of my pet favorites, a flick I have long felt died an undeserved death, and I was psyched at the chance to see it again.

In synopsis, I admit the movie doesn’t sound like much. Or perhaps I should say it sounds way too familiar. A nutcase has put seven bombs on an ocean liner and threatens to sink the ship unless he’s given a ransom of £500,000. The ship is far from land, no other vessels are close enough to render assistance,...

Howard Keel on TCM Pt.2: Rose Marie, Pagan Love Song, Callaway Went Thataway Schedule (Et) and synopses from the TCM website: 6:00 Am Desperate Search (1953) A man fights to find his children after their plane crashes in the Canadian wilderness. Dir: Joseph Lewis. Cast: Howard Keel, Jane Greer, Patricia Medina. Bw-71 mins. 7:15 Am Fast Company (1953) The heiress to a racing stable uncovers underhanded dealings. Dir: John Sturges. Cast: Howard Keel, Polly Bergen, Marjorie Main. Bw-68 mins. 8:30 Am Kismet (1955) In this Arabian Nights musical "king of the beggars" infiltrates high society when his daughter is wooed by a handsome prince. Dir: Vincente Minnelli. Cast: Howard Keel, Ann Blyth, Dolores Gray. C-113 mins, Letterbox Format. 10:30 Am Rose Marie (1954) A trapper's daughter is torn between the Mountie who wants to civilize her and a dashing prospector. Dir: Mervyn LeRoy. Cast: Ann Blyth, Howard Keel, Fernando Lamas, Bert Lahr, Marjorie Main.

Updated through 5/10.

"The filmmaker and Oakland native Sidney Peterson once scatted that after World War II, San Francisco 'was a city hanging loose, a small pocket edition, for a brief period, of the Vienna of Wittgenstein and Musil, and the Zurich of Tzara, the Cologne, the Berlin, the Paris, the Hanover, the New York of Dada.'" In the New York Times, Manohla Dargis notes that the version of Radical Light: Alternative Film and Video in the San Francisco Bay Area, 1945 - 2000 presented at Anthology Film Archives today and tomorrow and at MoMA on Sunday and Monday "doesn't go as deep or as wide as the original, of course. But it's something of a movable feast nonetheless, and it gives you plenty to chew on, starting with an entire program dedicated to Peterson, a sculptor, painter and novelist whose adventures in the seventh art in the late 1940s turned him...

Netflix has revolutionized the home movie experience for fans of film with its instant streaming technology. Netflix Nuggets is my way of spreading the word about independent, classic and foreign films made available by Netflix for instant streaming.

This Week’s New Instant Releases… Title: Black Heaven (2010)

Streaming Available: 04/12/2011

Cast: Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet, Louise Bourgoin, Melvil Poupaud, Pauline Etienne, Pierre Niney, Ali Marhyar, Patrick Descamps, Pierre Vittet, Swann Arlaud, Francesco Merenda

Director: Gilles Marchand

Synopsis: While searching for the owner of a missing mobile phone with his girlfriend, Marion (Pauline Etienne), Gaspard (Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet) falls for the mysterious Sam (Louise Bourgoin), who draws him into a dangerous virtual-reality video game, where she provokes unsuspecting victims into killing themselves. Directed by Gilles Marchand, this intense French drama alternates between real-life events and those within the simulated computer world. Title: Heartless (2009)

Streaming Available: 04/12/2011

Cast: Jim Sturgess, Clémence Poésy , Noel Clarke, Luke Treadaway, Justin Salinger,...

Peter Hall, 1973, 12, Fremantle

A combination of the original 1965 RSC casts at the Aldwych and on Broadway (Paul Rogers, Ian Holm, Cyril Cusack, Vivien Merchant, Michael Jayston, Terence Rigby), of what many regard as Harold Pinter's finest play, are reunited with Peter Hall under the auspices of the American Film Theatre. This is the definitive record of Pinter's tragicomedy of territorial imperatives. The dark family secrets of a menacing, all-male, north London household are revealed when the academic white sheep of a working-class, crime-related family brings his seductive wife from the States to meet his misogynistic father, uncle and brothers. John Bury's stage sets are beautifully lit by ace cinematographer David Watkin and it's Hall's finest work for the cinema. Also in the double-disc set is an informative, unpretentious documentary assembled by Philip Saville, in which a variety of friends and fellow actors, including Steven Berkoff, Henry Goodman, Sheila Hancock and Michael Caine,...

When critic David Ehrenstein told actor Sir Ian McKellen that there existed a photograph of actor Roddy McDowell (How Green was My Valley, Planet of the Apes) performing oral sex upon himself, the great stage and screen star's response was immediate: "Put it up on the internet!" he boomed, in the voice that breathed life in to Gandalf the Grey.

Alas, or not, the image under discussion still apparently lacks a public forum, and is as elusive as McDowell's sole film as director, Tam Lin a.k.a. The Ballad of Tam-Lin a.k.a. The Devil's Widow, starring Ava Gardner.

1970, of course, was the one year in the history of western civilization when the ability to self-fellate was alone enough to guarantee a directing career, and so it was that McDowell found himself in Scotland, filming Ian McShane (sweary Al Swearingen from TV's Deadwood) running screaming through a swamp on Lsd.