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All in the Family is roundly considered a touchstone for television achievement now, but when it debuted 50 years ago, even the network carrying it hoped it would fizzle quickly and unnoticed. CBS put an army of operators at phone lines expecting a barrage of complaints from offended middle Americans demanding its cancellation. Those calls didn’t come. What came was a deluge of support from people hoping this mid-season replacement was a permanent addition to the network’s lineup. The premiere episode contained a considerable list of “television firsts.” One of these rarities continues to remain scarce on network TV: creator Norman Lear trusted the intelligence of the viewing audience. To celebrate All in the Family’s 50th anniversary, we look back at its journey from conception to broadcast, and how it continues to influence and inform entertainment and society today.

Actor Carroll O’Connor, who was a large part of...

As Disney quietly disappears huge swathes of film history into its vaults, I'm going to spend 2020 celebrating Twentieth Century Fox and the Fox Film Corporation's films, what one might call their output if only someone were putting it out.And now they've quietly disappeared William Fox's name from the company: guilty by association with Rupert Murdoch, even though he never associated with him.***There are some films where, lacking access to one's own personal cinematheque, one has to speculate. For example, some of Fox's fifties films, shot in CinemaScope as all movies at that studio had to be, have never been made available in widescreen formats. Richard Fleischer was one the directors who adapted zestfully to that format, so it's a crying shame that Crack in the Mirror (1960) seems to exist only in blurry, 4:3 TV recordings. His other Orson Welles film, Compulsion (1959), is a cracker.Anatole Litvak's...

The BFI’s Missing Believed Wiped returns to BFI Southbank this December to present British television rediscoveries, not seen by audiences for decades, most since their original transmission dates…. The bespoke line-up of TV gems feature some of the countries most-loved television celebrities and iconic characters including Alf Garnett in Till Death Us Do Part: Sex Before Marriage, Cilla Black in her eponymous BBC show featuring Dudley Moore , Jimmy Edwards in Whack-o!, a rare interview with Peter Davison about playing Doctor Who, an appearance by future Doctor Who Patrick Troughton from ITV’s early police drama, No Hiding Place plus a significant screen debut from a young Pete Postlethwaite.

However for Nerdly readers, one of the real highlights of this edition of Missing Believed Wiped is the uncovering of TV horror Late Night Horror: The Corpse Can’t Play. Originally broadcast on 3 May, 1968 on BBC2 this is the only...

In her new book Rachel Cooke re-examines the 1950s through 10 women who pioneered in their careers. In this extract she tells the stories of sisters-in-law Muriel and Betty Box, two prominent women in the British film industry

Until recently, anyone who wanted to see the film To Dorothy a Son had to lock themselves deep in the bowels of the British Film Institute off Tottenham Court Road, London, and watch it on an old Steenbeck editing machine. A little-known comedy from 1954, To Dorothy is no one's idea of a classic. It has an infuriating star in Shelley Winters, a creaky screenplay by Peter Rogers (later the producer of the Carry On series) and a set that looks as if it is on loan from a local amateur dramatics society.

We are in the home of Tony (John Gregson) and his baby-faced wife, Dorothy (Peggy Cummins). Dorothy is heavily pregnant, and confined to bed.

Calling all Beatles fans… the group’s second feature film, 1965’s Help!, will be released on Blu-ray on Tuesday, June 25 and Wamg is giving away copies to 2 lucky readers.

Directed by Richard Lester, who also directed the band’s debut feature film, 1964’s A Hard Day’s Night, Help! follows The Beatles as they become passive recipients of an outside plot that revolves around Ringo’s possession of a sacrificial ring, which he cannot remove from his finger. As a result, he and his bandmates John, Paul and George are chased from London to the Austrian Alps and the Bahamas by religious cult members, a mad scientist and the London police.

In addition to starring The Beatles, Help! boasts a witty script, a great cast of British character actors, and classic Beatles songs “Help!,” “You’re Going To Lose That Girl,” “You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away,” “Ticket To Ride,...

The Beatles’ second feature film, 1965’s Help!, is on the way on Blu-ray. On June 24 (June 25 in North America), Help! makes its eagerly awaited Blu-ray debut in a single-disc package pairing the digitally restored film and 5.1 soundtrack with an hour of extra features, including a 30-minute documentary about the making of the film, memories of the cast and crew, an in-depth look at the restoration process, an outtake scene, and original theatrical trailers and radio spots. An introduction by the film’s director, Richard Lester, and an appreciation by Martin Scorsese are included in the Blu-ray’s booklet.

Help!’s Blu-ray edition follows the 2012 release of The Beatles’ digitally restored Yellow Submarine and Magical Mystery Tour feature films on Blu-ray, DVD and iTunes with extensive extras. Help!’s restoration for its 2007 DVD debut wowed viewers, earning five-times platinum sales in the U.S. and praise from a broad range of...

The 1948 film The Fallen Idol set for a new remake It seems that a high-powered producing team is readying a remake of a 1948 film. Deadline London is reporting that producers Walter Parkes and Laurie McDonald are setting up a remake of The Fallen Idol.

Screenwriter David Farr is writing the reboot to the 1949 film, which was directed by Carol Reed and written by Graham Greene. Parkes and McDonald are developing the film through Studio Canal, which owns the rights to the original film and it was said they would not seek out financing until they have a completed script, director, cast and budget lined up.

The original film told the tale of a young Lon boy who looked up to his family's butler until one day his image of the butler is shattered when he sees the married butler with another woman and also witnesses what could be a murder.

Oscar-winning director William Friedkin.

In July of 1997, I conducted the first of two lengthy interviews with director William Friedkin, regarded by many as the "enfant terrible" of the so-called "Easy Riders and Raging Bulls" generation of filmmakers who, for one brief, shining moment, seemed to reinvent American cinema in the late '60s thru the late '70s. Meeting Friedkin was something of a milestone for me at the time: I was still in my 20s, had been writing for Venice Magazine less than a year, and "Billy," as he likes people to call him, was the first person I interviewed who was one of my childhood heroes--a filmmaker whose one-sheets hung on my bedroom walls when I was growing up.

Below are the two interviews, conducted a decade apart from one another, and posted in reverse chronology. In both, Billy reveals a cunning intellect, a sometimes abrasive personal style,...