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This adaptation of Sean O’Casey’s play about a Dublin family trying to get by might best be described as one for completists, in terms of Alfred Hitchock’s body of work. Theatrical, both in its staging, which is largely confined to a single room, and in terms of its performance, which is broad by today’s standards, it was nevertheless well received at the time.

Sara Allgood (who was the first to play Juno on the stage) is the best of the performers, generating a decent amount of emotion as the story hits its increasing number of melodramatic beats, including a crucial monologue. She plays Juno Boyle, a Dublin matriarch who has her hands full trying to make ends meet while coping with her workshy husband Jack (Edward Chapman), the “paycock/peacock” of the title. The couple have a son Johnny (John Laurie, who would go on to find fame late in life as.

All those British crime films once deemed undesirable for the National Image are beginning to get the attention they deserve. This story of a single day in a working class section of London has plenty of criminal activity but blends it in with the everyday crimes of desperation and boredom. The Sandigate girls are flirting with trouble but Googie Withers’ Rose Sandigate has gone much further: she’s hiding an escaped fugitive who was once her lover in the vain hope of recapturing her lost youth. Director Robert Hamer examines a dozen distinctive characters on the edge of respectability, in one of the most original ‘Brit noirs’ we’ve seen to date.

It Always Rains on Sunday

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1947 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 92 min. / Street Date November 5, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Googie Withers, John McCallum, Jack Warner, Edward Chapman, Susan Shaw, Patricia Plunkett, Nigel Stock, David Lines, Sydney Tafler,...

Hammer’s copycat Quatermass picture stands apart from similar ‘mystery sci-fi monster’ thrillers by virtue of its serious tone and realistic presentation. Talk about a sober semi-docu style: there are no major female roles and the leading character is a mass of radioactive mud. (Is there an election year joke in that?) Hammer found a new writer in Jimmy Sangster, imported the Yankee name actor Dean Jagger, tried to hire the expatriate director Joseph Losey. Former child actor Anthony Newley has a small part, but he doesn’t get to sing X’s theme song: “Who can I turn to, when nobody needs me, because the flesh is melting from my skull?”

X The Unknown

Blu-ray

Scream Factory

1956 / B&w / 1:75 widescreen / 80 81? min. / X…the Unknown / Street Date February 18, 2020

Starring: Dean Jagger, Edward Chapman, Leo McKern, Anthony Newley, William Lucas, Michael Ripper.

Cinematography: Gerald Gibbs

Film Editor: Philip Leakey

Makeup:...

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,...

Ray Milland produces, directs and stars in this odd, forgotten travelogue / adventure / romance /crime tale filmed in Portugal’s beautiful capital. Claude Rains is magnificent, Maureen O’Hara is okay and relative newcomer Yvonne Furneaux is a knockout. Most remembered is Nelson Riddle’s adaptation of the film’s title theme, one of the most admired pop instrumentals of the 1950s. Filmed in Republic’s ‘Naturama’ and ‘Trucolor,’ both of which prompt plenty of fuzzy man Savant-‘splaining.

Lisbon

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1956 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 90 min. / Street Date November 6, 2018 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Ray Milland, Maureen O’Hara, Claude Rains, Yvonne Furneaux, Francis Lederer, Percy Marmont, Jay Novello, Edward Chapman, Harold Jamieson, Robie Lester.

Cinematography: Jack Marta (Naturama and Trucolor)

Film Editor: Richard L. Van Enger

Original Music: Nelson Riddle

Written by John Tucker Battle, story by Martin Rackin

Associate-Produced and Directed by R. Milland

Lisbon is one...

Stars: Mandy Miller, Phyllis Calvert, Jack Hawkins, Terence Morgan, Godfrey Tearle, Marjorie Fielding, Nancy Price, Edward Chapman, Patricia Plunkett, Eleanor Summerfield, Colin Gordon | Written by Nigel Balchin, Jack Whittingham | Directed by Alexander Mackendrick

When you watch Mandy, you can’t help but feel it was a film ahead of its time. The story of a deaf girl unable to speak, the new Blu-ray is the perfect chance to watch the movie again.

When Mandy’s (Mandy Miller) parents discover that their child is deaf, they struggle to help her communicate not only with the outside world, but with themselves too. When Christine (Phyllis Calvert), the mother, decides to take Mandy to a school for deaf children, her husband’s reluctance to allow this puts a strain on their marriage.

What is impressive about Mandy is that it doesn’t over dramatise the story of a little girl trapped in her own little world,...

Stars: Paul Robeson, Edward Chapman, Simon Lack, Rachel Thomas, Edward Rigby, Dilys Thomas, Janet Johnson, Charles Williams, Jack Jones, Dilys Davies, Clifford Evans | Written by Pen Tennyson, Jack Jones, Louis Golding | Directed by Pen Tennyson

In the past, Wales has been synonymous with mining and choirs, and while times have changed the Welsh are still known for their vocal prowess, even if the mines have all but gone. The Proud Valley is a classic that has now been released on Blu-ray, that not only shows off the best of Welsh, but also the very talented Paul Robeson.

When David Goliath (Paul Robeson), an African-American seaman turns up in a small mining village, they are soon charmed by his powerful singing voice. Working down the mines to earn his rent, it looks like he and the choir are all set to win the national choir contest, until disaster strikes. With the...

Author: Competitions

To mark the release of The Proud Valley on 27th March, we’ve been given 3 copies to give away on Blu-ray.

David Goliath (Paul Robeson), a charismatic African-American stoker, washes up in a small Welsh village where he finds work alongside the miners down the pit. A competent singer, Goliath’s roaring voice soon draws the attention of the local choir master Dick Parry (Simon Lack: The Silver Darlings, Enemy at the Door) and his son Emlyn (Edward Chapman: Convoy, It Always Rains on Sunday), who have ambitions of winning the national choir contest.

Following a deadly explosion, the pits are closed, leaving the villagers out of work and struggling to make ends meet. Wanting to help the community that welcomed him so generously, David rouses a group of activists to march to London in the hope of reopening the mine in time to serve the...

In a novel effort to stress that film noir wasn’t a film movement specifically an output solely produced for American audiences, Kino Lorber releases a five disc set of obscure noir examples released in the UK. Spanning a near ten year period from 1943 to 1952, the titles displayed here do seem to chart a progression in tone, at least resulting in parallels with American counterparts. Though a couple of the selections here aren’t very noteworthy, either as artifacts of British noir or items worthy of reappraisal, it does contain items of considerable interest, including rare titles from forgotten or underrated auteurs like Ronald Neame, Roy Ward Baker, and Ralph Thomas.

They Met in the Dark

The earliest title in this collection is a 1943 title from Karel Lamac, They Met in the Dark, a pseudo-comedy noir that barely meets the criteria. Based on a novel by Anthony Gilbert (whose novel...

Raymond Massey ca. 1940. Raymond Massey movies: From Lincoln to Boris Karloff Though hardly remembered today, the Toronto-born Raymond Massey was a top supporting player – and sometime lead – in both British and American movies from the early '30s all the way to the early '60s. During that period, Massey was featured in nearly 50 films. Turner Classic Movies generally selects the same old MGM / Rko / Warner Bros. stars for its annual “Summer Under the Stars” series. For that reason, it's great to see someone like Raymond Massey – who was with Warners in the '40s – be the focus of a whole day: Sat., Aug. 8, '15. (See TCM's Raymond Massey movie schedule further below.) Admittedly, despite his prestige – his stage credits included the title role in the short-lived 1931 Broadway production of Hamlet – the quality of Massey's performances varied wildly. Sometimes he could be quite effective; most of the time, however, he was an unabashed scenery chewer,...

The October Man

Written by Eric Ambler

Directed by Roy Ward Baker

U.K., 1947

Jim Ackland (John Mills) is riding the bus with his niece one dark and stormy night. The vehicle is filled to the brim with passengers, some fast asleep, others enjoying time with their loved ones. Fate sees that Jim’s life is turned upside down however, as a mechanical failure sends the bus off track, crashing into a wall. The last thing Jim recalls before blacking out is the harrowing horn of an oncoming train. Months later, Jim is finally relieved from his hospital stay, although warned by the doctor that his recovery from the fracture in his skull will require time, and that he may even experience difficult episodes of relapse. Confident that things are on the mend, Jim rents a hotel room as his new living quarters and finds employment at a nearby chemical lab.

"We're such little creatures. Poor humanity's so fragile, so weak. Little, little animals." So said Edward Chapman at the end of H.G. Wells' 1936 sci-fi, war, epic, Things to Come. Wells' animal reference in regards to human beings falls under both fact and metaphor. We are all animals, but something darker, more vicious, seems to always be growing at the heart of this humanity we call ourselves. It wouldn't be until 1968 that the animals or, in this case, apes would really take over the world. Planet of the Apes was a cultural phenomenon that I really don't need to tell you about, a shock-wave of a franchise that would only need a little time before it sprung into action once more. We never expected the franchise would return like this. It's difficult to keep from saying 2011's Rise of the Planet of the Apes shouldn't have worked. Every movie has...

Feature Alex Westthorp 28 Mar 2014 - 07:00

In a new series, Alex talks us through the film roles of the actors who've played the Doctor. First up, William Hartnell and Jon Pertwee...

We know them best as the twelve very different incarnations of the Doctor. But all the actors who've been the star of Doctor Who, being such good all-rounders in the first place, have also had film careers. Admittedly, some CVs are more impressive than others, but this retrospective attempts to pick out some of the many worthwhile films which have starred, featured or seen a fleeting cameo by the actors who would become (or had been) the Doctor.

William Hartnell was, above all else, a film star. He is by far the most prolific film actor of the main twelve to play the Time Lord. With over 70 films to his name, summarising Hartnell's film career is difficult at best.

★★★★☆ A key part of the BFI's Ealing: Light and Dark season and rereleased this Friday, Robert Hamer's It Always Rains on Sunday (1947) is a much-underrated kitchen sink crime drama set over one dreary Sunday, telling a tale of working-class life set within London's East End. Based on the novel by Arthur La Bernby, the story concerns the family life of Rose Sandgate (Googie Withers), a typical East End housewife married to the much older George (Edward Chapman) and living with his two young daughter Vi (Susan Shaw) and Doris (Patricia Plunkett) and their own young son, Alfie (David Lines).

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Knockabout clown in the music hall tradition who found enormous success in the cinema

Engulfed by helpless, gurgling mirth, Norman Wisdom would subside to the ground as if suddenly rendered boneless: it needed someone only to look at him to make him fall down. Often, the person looking at him – and sternly, at that – was Jerry Desmonde, doyen of variety straight men, who represented the figure of authority in many of Wisdom's hugely successful film farces of the 1950s and 1960s.

Wisdom, who has died aged 95, was almost the last in a great tradition of knockabout, slapstick clowns, a performer who relied less on words than on an acrobatic physical dexterity to gain his laughs. He was usually derided or ignored by the serious critics, but in his day he was adored by the public, and because of its nature his craft travelled well – he was immensely popular in many other countries,...