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Courtesy of StudioCanal

by James Cameron-wilson

Few films in the Swinging Sixties were as much a part of their time as John Schlesinger’s Darling. Chronologically positioned between Godard’s Breathless and Antonioni’s Blow Up, it is a microcosm of the tail end of an empire that was enjoying its last twitch of cultural significance. The Darling of the title is the extremely beautiful, self-absorbed and cosseted Diana Scott played by the It girl of the day, Julie Christie, the face of Ideal Woman magazine. And she would seem, indeed, to be the Ideal Woman, beloved of cads, intellectuals and royalty. The thumbnail premise is attributed to three men, the scenarist Frederic Raphael, the director John Schlesinger and the producer Joseph Janni, and it is Raphael who has provided the sparkling dialogue. Essentially it’s a satire of Britain in the mid-1960s, with Julie Christie the Carnaby Street...

Do you ever lapse into daydream fantasies to escape from everyday life? Tom Courtenay and John Schlesinger changed their destinies and that of Julie Christie with this brilliant (black?) comedy about what ought to be a tragic situation. The frustrated Billy rebels against his dull routine with outrageous lies and chicanery, but hasn’t the courage to strike forth on his own — even when invited to do so by the girl of his dreams. Schlesinger’s delightful directorial style applies brash New Wave editing to Billy’s grandiose ‘Walter Mitty’ fantasies.

Billy Liar

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1963 / B&w / 2:35 widescreen / 98 min. / Street Date April 28, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Tom Courtenay, Julie Christie, Wilfred Pickles, Mona Washbourne, Ethel Griffies, Finlay Currie.

Cinematography: Denys N. Coop

Film Editor: Roger Cherrill

Original Music: Richard Rodney Bennett

Written by Keith Waterhouse, Willis Hall from their play

Produced by Joseph Janni

Directed by...

A million American GIs are bivouacked in the English countryside, awaiting debarkation to France… and the green fields are loaded with young English women, whose own men have been off fighting for years. John Schlesinger puts together a good drama, with an excellent cast; he also avoids the expected ‘please wait for me!’ clichés attendant to this subgenre of war film.

Yanks

Blu-ray

Twilight Time

1979 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 139 min. / Street Date , 2019 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store / 29.95

Starring: Richard Gere, Lisa Eichhorn, Vanessa Redgrave, William Devane, Chick Vennera, Wendy Morgan, Rachel Roberts, Tony Melody, Derek Thompson.

Cinematography: Dick Bush

Film Editor: Jim Clark

Original Music: Richard Rodney Bennett

Written by Colin Welland, Walter Bernstein

Produced by Joseph Janni, Lester Persky

Directed by John Schlesinger

Director John Boorman got to tell his personal wartime home front story in his warm and funny Hope and Glory, and eight years earlier the...

Joseph Losey doesn't normally make trendy, lighthearted genre films, and in this SuperSpy epic we find out why -- an impressive production and great music don't compensate for a lack of pace and dynamism, not to mention a narrow sense of humor. Yet it's a lounge classic, and a perverse favorite of spy movie fans. Modesty Blaise Blu-ray Kl Studio Classics 1966 / Color / 1:66 widescreen / 119 min. / Street Date August 23, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Monica Vitti, Terence Stamp, Dirk Bogarde, Harry Andrews, Michael Craig, Clive Revill, Alexander Knox, Rossella Falk, Scilla Gabel, Tina Marquand Cinematography Jack Hildyard Production Designer Richard MacDonald, Jack Shampan Film Editor Reginald Beck Original Music John Dankworth Written by Evan Jones from a novel by Peter O'Donnell and a comic strip by Jim Holdaway Produced by Joseph Janni Directed by Joseph Losey

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

When I first reviewed a DVD of Modesty Blaise fourteen years ago,...