Alan Bates
During a memorial for his father, WW II hero Major James Prentis confesses a dark family secret to his son, something he has harbored for more than 20 years.
Journey into "Hamlet"-the play and the man-through the experiences of some of the major actors and directors who have brought Shakespeare's great tragedy to life. Christopher Plummer, David Tennant, John Nettles, John Simm, Sir Trevor Nunn, Franco Zeffirelli, Philip Saville, and others explore the enduring appeal of the Prince of Denmark more than 400 years after his stage debut.
The making of a serious, Canadian art house film descends into Hollywood farce when its producer is forced to compromise his vision to accommodate his drug-addled star, his leading lady and his venal backers.
The film is set in France in the 1990s, the French were defeated by the Germans early in World War II, an armistice was signed in 1940 which effectively split France into a German occupied part in the North and a semi-independent part in the south which became known as Vichy France. In reality the Vichy government was a puppet regime controlled by the Germans. Part of the agreement was that the Vichy Government would assist with the 'cleansing' of Jews from France. The Vichy government formed a police force called the Milice, who worked with the Germans...
Two childhood friends - Darren and Gary - re-unite for the funeral of an old acquaintance. Gary boasts of the life he's made in London during the four years he's been away. Darren is still living in the same town they're from. It doesn't take long before the timid and easily-lead Darren, drawn in by his charismatic friend, finds himself in trouble as the pair check out old haunts, mates and ex-girlfriends.
When the president of Russia suddenly dies, a man whose politics are virtually unknown succeeds him. The change in political leaders sparks paranoia among American CIA officials, so CIA director Bill Cabot recruits a young analyst to supply insight and advice on the situation. Then the unthinkable happens: a nuclear bomb explodes in a U.S. city, and America is quick to blame the Russians.
Desmond Doyle is devastated when his wife abandons their family on the day after Christmas. His unemployment and the fact that there is no woman in the house to care for the children, Evelyn, Dermot and Maurice, make it clear to the authorities that his is an untenable situation. The Catholic Church and the Irish courts decide to put the Doyle children into Church-run orphanages.
The film recounts the sobering tale of how 19 innocent lives were taken in a community experiencing paranoid hysteria regarding the suspected - but unproved - presence of the occult in the small New England town.
A documentary giving film fans a behind-the-scenes look at the making this Robert Altman film about a murder at an English country estate. Includes interviews with the cast and crew, who relate some of their experiences with making the film, as well as giving their views on all the work that went into it.
The duke of York, nicknamed Bertie, was born as royal 'spare heir', younger brother to the prince of Wales, and thus expected to spend a relatively private life with his Scottish wife Elisabeth Bowes-Lyon and their daughters, in the shadow of their reigning father, George V, and next that of his elder brother who succeeded to the British throne as Edward VIII. However Edward decides to put his love for a divorced American, Wallis Simpson, above dynastic duty, and ends up abdicating the throne, which now falls to Bertie, who reigns as George VI.
Reporter John Klein is plunged into a world of impossible terror and unthinkable chaos when fate draws him to a sleepy West Virginia town whose residents are being visited by a great winged shape that sows hideous nightmares and fevered visions.
In 1930’s England, a group of pretentious rich and famous gather together for a weekend of relaxation at a hunting resort. But when a murder occurs, each one of these interesting characters becomes a suspect.
Dramatization of Nancy Mitford's novel about three aristocratic young girls' adventures in love.
In a historical interview only a few months before his death, the harger-than-life star of Zorba the Greek seaks frankly about his memorable role, his tumultuous marriages and 13 children, and his insatiable passion for art. Arnold Schwarnegger, Alan Bates, Francesco Quinn, Alex Quinn, Lorenzo Quinn amongst others offer exclusive personal anecdotes on the man behind the legend.
Steve Barron, Peter Barnes, Andy Serkis, Ayesha Dharker, Vanessa Mae, Peter Guinness, Robert Halmi Sr., Jim Carter, Dyson Lovell, John Leguizamo, Pik Sen Lim, Nigel Wooll, Rufus Sewell, Amira Casar, Howard Ellis, Dougray Scott, Hugh Quarshie, Alexis Conran, Robert Halmi Jr.
An adaptation of the classic, "The Prince and the Pauper" is the retelling of Edward Tudor and young Thomas Canty, two amazing look-alikes caught up in imperial intrigue and scandal. In fleeing from his violent father, Tom stumbles into the palace courtyard, and is seen by young Prince Edward, who takes him in. Each desiring to see what the other's life is like, the boys impulsively switch identities... little knowing what disaster lies ahead at this fault of thought. And soon Thomas becomes a pawn in the hands of Edward's malicious and greedy uncle, who would have the kingdom for himself.
A young Christian boy attends a druid worship that is attacked by invading Irish tribes. Taken captive, he is taken back to Ireland to become a slave. Enduring many hardships, he finds comfort and eventually salvation in his faith. After several years, he escapes back to England, where he joins a convent to prove his faith. His greatest desire is to return to Ireland to convert the Irish to Christianity. Years later, he is given the opportunity. Upon setting foot on the Irish soil, all snakes are aitomatically driven from the land. He then overcomes many obstacles, including disagreements with the British Cardinal (Malcolm McDowell), to fulfill his destiny and ultimately being given Sainthood.
In the Beginning is a 2-part biblical television miniseries directed by Kevin Connor. It stars Martin Landau and Jacqueline Bisset and it premiered on NBC on November 12, 2000.
Madame Ranevskaya (Rampling) is a spoiled aging aristocratic lady, who returns from a trip to Paris to face the loss of her magnificent Cherry Orchard estate after a default on the mortgage. In denial, she continues living in the past, deluding herself and her family, while the beautiful cherry trees are being axed down by the re-possessor Lopakhin (Teale), her former serf, who has his own agenda.
Fact based drama about an American couple on vacation in Italy in 1994 with their two children who are attacked and shot by highway bandits. Shortly they discover that their son is brain dead. The parents are then faced with the hard decision to donate the boy's organs which ultimately led to saving the lives of seven seriously ill Italian patients.
Sir Hugo is more interested in reconstructing dinosaur bones than in paying attention to his wife, Lady Harriet. He's not thrilled when daughter Cleo brings home her betrothed, Sidney, who aspires to be a poet. The new butler, Fledge, provides Lady Harriet with the attention she's been missing and then seduces Sidney. Did he have a role in Sidney's disappearance as well?
Oliver's Travels is a five-part television serial written by Alan Plater and starring Alan Bates, Sinéad Cusack, Bill Paterson, and Miles Anderson. It first aired in the UK in 1995. Bates plays the titular Oliver, a keen word-game enthusiast and lecturer in comparative religion. After his teaching post is made redundant, he resolves to make use of his new wealth of free time by going to visit his favourite crossword compiler, 'Aristotle', with whom he has corresponded but whom he has never met. When he arrives, however, he finds Aristotle's house has been ransacked and its occupant has departed for parts unknown, and he sets out to discover why.
Mad with grief after the death of his Kiowa wife, Roe awaits death under a tree with her body beside him. She begins to haunt him because he won't bury her. His father, who bought him the wife, thinks her sister might reason with Roe.
Major James Prentis VC (Sir Alan Bates) is a British spy of World War II and war hero who goes under the code name of "Shuttlecock". Alienated from his family and children, he ends up in a mental institution in Lisbon, Portugal.
In 1950, a man returns home to the UK from India after the death of his wife to build bridges with his son, but instead ends up building an elaborate model railway.
As an express train hurtles towards its destination, John (Alan Bates) a man whose sanity hangs by a thread, attempts to uncover his possible role in a brutal murder and the identity of the victim. The balance of his mind is strained to the limits by dark memories of a punishing childhood and a passionate jealousy for a beautiful young woman (Gina Bellman) - who may be a prostitute... or his wife.
Frost is arrested and committed for murder after he is apprehended burying his victims in the garden. However, even while under psychiatric care and tight hospital security, it becomes obvious that Mr. Frost is not all he seems to be, but he is dangerous nonetheless
In 1916 author Marcel Proust is leading a reclusive life in Paris. He hires a quartet of musicians and befriends one of them, a wounded serviceman.
In Stoppard's "LeCarrecature, Rupert Purvis jumps off a bridge onto a dog, and causes problems for Blair, his superior at MI5. And Blair must convince Hogbin, the agent who's been tailing Purvis, of which side Purvis is really on--once he finds out what it is.
Force Majeure (Uncontrollable Circumstances) begins with a drug deal involving tourists Phillipe (Patrick Bruel) and Daniel (Francois Cluzet), and a Dutch stranger. Two years pass: the Dutchman has been arrested in an unspecified Asian country, where the penalty for drug trafficking is death. Phillipe and Daniel agree to admit that the hashish partly belongs to them, which will reduce the Dutchman's sentence, but also subject the twosome to a prison sentence themselves. Malcolm Forrest (Alan Bates), a representative of Amnesty International, does what he can to aid all three of the unfortunate young men. Force Majeure was co-written by Michele De Broca, wife of director Philippe De Broca.
An aimless young man, Johnny, is sent prison. He entrusts his beloved dog, Evie, to the care of his former lover and best friend, Frank. When he gets out of prison, he has to face difficulties at home. Added to this, is the fact that he may have to give up Evie to Frank.
When Stephanie, a famous violinist, contracts multiple sclerosis her life begins to fall apart. Her career ends, her husband leaves her for another woman and her favorite pupil leave the country. Unable to bear all this loss, Stephanie attempts suicide.
Jack Higgins' straightforward thriller about a guilt-ridden IRA bomber forced into "one last job"
Powerful statement about the abuse of human rights by totalitarian governments, finds an unctuous and "civilized" interrogator humiliating the doomed members of a family who have become enemies of the state. Doollee.com
Dr. Fischer has an unusual hobby - to expose human greed. How much humiliation will his fellow man endure enticed by valuable presents? Dignity for money! Death for money?
A successful lawyer struck with blindness in middle age continues his battles in the courtroom with the assistance of his family. As his son deals with bitter memories of their relationship, he also seeks his father's respect and love and in the process learns to love in return.
Caroline is to be wed to Sir Ralph and invites her sister Barbara to be her bridesmaid. Barbara seduces Ralph, however, and she becomes the new Lady, but despite her new wealthy situation, she gets bored and turns to highway robbery for thrills. While on the road she meets a famous highwayman, and they continue as a team, but some people begin suspecting her identity, and she risks death if she continues her nefarious activities.
Two one-act plays explore love and loneliness. In "Table by the Window" an aging fashion model contrives a reunion with her ex-husband, a politician ruined by scandal, and their passion is rekindled. In "Table Number Seven" a meek woman harbors a secret love for a man accused of fraud and sex offenses, forcing her to take a stand for the first time in her life.
The horrors of World War I have robbed returning veteran Chris Baldry of his memory. The traumatized soldier doesn't even recognize his own wife, Kitty, or remember their years together. While Baldry attempts to cope with the unfamiliar surroundings of his own home, he seeks out the company of an old flame from his childhood, Margaret Grey. His amnesia also makes him a ready target for the affections of his older cousin, Jenny.
Actress Coral Browne travels to Moscow, and meets a mysterious Englishman. Turns out he's the notorious spy, Guy Burgess. Based on a true story, with Ms. Browne playing herself.
Britannia Hospital, an esteemed English institution, is marking its gala anniversary with a visit by the Queen Mother herself. But when investigative reporter Mick Travis arrives to cover the celebration, he finds the hospital under siege by striking workers, ruthless unions, violent demonstrators, racist aristocrats, and African cannibal dictator and sinister human experiments.
Adapted from the D. H. Lawrence novel this tells the romantic story of Siegmund and Helena. Siegmund, an orchestral violinist who is married with three children, has tutored Helena for several years and they've fallen in love but he will not leave his wife or consummate their passion physically. Helena arranges for them to go on an idyllic holiday to the Isle of Wight, hoping that will convince Siegmund to break away from his marriage and they can be together.
The film suggests Nijinsky was driven into madness by both his consuming ambition and self-enforced heterosexuality, the latter prompted by his romantic involvement with Romola de Pulszky, a society girl who joins impresario Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes specifically to seduce Nijinsky. After a series of misunderstandings with Diaghilev, who is both his domineering mentor and possessive lover, Nijinsky succumbs to Romola's charms and marries her, after which his gradual decline from artistic moodiness to complete lunacy begins.
Bored while officiating a cricket match at a psychiatric hospital, Crossley tells Graves (a visitor) the tale of a mysterious stranger (also named Crossley) who invades the lives and house of a local musician and his wife. The stranger claims knowledge of real magic, which he uses to displace his host and dominate his wife. The musician must find a way to combat Crossley and his seemingly implacable powers. Graves doubts Crossley's claim that the story is true, and begins to believe that Crossley is actually one of the patients.
A wealthy woman from Manhattan's Upper East Side struggles to deal with her new identity and her sexuality after her husband of 16 years leaves her for a younger woman.
The story of a man of character. Adapted from the Thomas Hardy novel.
Set in the rarefied world of West End boutique owners and fashion designers, The Collection takes as its departure point the moment when four elegant lives are suddenly shaken by the suggestion of infidelity. The sinister anonymous phone call that disturbs Harry Kane at four o'clock in the morning becomes increasingly hard to establish...
A barrister's complex life unravels as he juggles a court case and highly-strung mistress.
An author writes to his old schoolmate, telling him he is going to reveal a secret they have shared since the 1950s.
In a Yorkshire mining town, three educated brothers return to their blue-collar home to celebrate the 40th wedding anniversary of their parents, but dark secrets come to the fore.
Cowardly rogue Harry Flashman's (Malcolm McDowell) schemes to gain entry to the royal circles of 19th-century Europe go nowhere until he meets a pair of devious nobles with their own agenda. At their urging, Flashman agrees to re-create himself as a bogus Prussian nobleman to woo a beautiful duchess. But the half-baked plan quickly comes unraveled, and he's soon on the run from several new enemies who are all calling for the rapscallion's head.
Butley is set in Queen Mary’s College, London and focuses on two English instructors, Ben Butley, a middle-aged former T. S. Eliot expert whose life is now in a shambles, and his protégé, Joey, a homosexual. With both Joey and his wife leaving, Butley faces a life alone, fighting back with wit, obscenity and booze.
This film recounts the tales of the Biblical figures, Jacob and Joseph. The first part tells the story of Jacob fleeing his tribe when he cheats his brother out of his birthright, gets cheated himself in his exile years while learning of the need to make amends. The second part is of the story of Jacob's favorite son, Joseph. Betrayed and sold into slavery by his brothers, he meets and overcomes all adversity to become the Prime Minister of Egypt, second only to the Pharaoh.
Harry is a married writer who has an affair with a woman whose husband knows that she is unfaithful. As a result of his work, Harry has trouble distinguishing between fantasy and reality leaving us to wonder whether the affair is real or just a figment of Harry's imagination.
A short film based on a story by D.H. Lawrence in which two sisters meet after being apart for a long time.
A couple uses extremely black comedy to survive taking care of a daughter who is nearly completely brain dead. They take turns doing the daughter's voice and stare into the eyes of death and emotional trauma with a humour that hides their pain.
British teenager Leo Colston (Dominic Guard) spends a summer in the countryside, where he develops a crush on the beautiful young aristocrat Marian (Julie Christie). Eager to impress her, Leo becomes the "go-between" for Marian, delivering secret romantic letters to Ted Burgess (Alan Bates), a handsome neighboring farmer.
Growing up in the sheltered confines of a 1920's English coal-mining community, free-spirited sisters Gudrun and Ursula explore erotic love with a wealthy playboy and a philosophical educator, with cataclysmic results for all four.
Set in tsarist Russia around the turn of the century and based on a true story of a Russian Jewish peasant Yakov Bog who was wrongly imprisoned for a most unlikely crime - the “ritual murder” of a Gentile child in Kiev. We witness the unrelenting detail of the peasant-handyman's life in prison and see him gain in dignity as the efforts to humiliate him and make him confess fail.
Bathsheba Everdine, a willful, flirtatious, young woman, unexpectedly inherits a large farm and becomes romantically involved with three widely divergent men.
A homely but vivacious young woman dodges the amorous attentions of her father's middle-aged employer while striving to capture some of the glamorous life of her swinging London roommate.
An ornithologist mistaken for an explosives expert is sent alone into a small French town during WWI to investigate a garbled report from the resistance about a bomb which the departing Germans have set to blow up a weapons cache.
Aston (Robert Shaw), a quiet, reserved man, lives alone in a top-floor cluttered room of a small abandoned house in a poor London district. He befriends and takes in Mac Davies (Donald Pleasence), an old derelict who has been fired from a menial job in a café. In time Aston offers him a job as caretaker of the house. Aston's brother, Mick (Alan Bates) - a taunting, quasi-sadist - harasses the derelict when his brother is away, countermanding his orders. Eventually Aston, himself irritated by the cantankerous old man, puts him out.
Success has James Brewster's name written all over it, and he also has his heart set on his boss's daughter. A con artist hires him to help out on a bank scheme, but then again, James will do anything to get rich and be the most successful businessman in Britain-even if it means murder!!!
An uptight English writer traveling to Crete on a matter of business finds his life changed forever when he meets the gregarious Alexis Zorba.
An insurance man (Alan Bates) gets chummy in Spain with a couple (Laurence Harvey, Lee Remick) who have collected on a fake death.
As Vic Brown vacillates between infatuation and disinterest for his co-worker Ingrid Rothwell, she finds out that she is pregnant and Vic has to reconcile how he thought his life would go with what life actually has in store for him.
When an injured wife murderer takes refuge on a remote Lancashire farm, the owner’s three children mistakenly believe him to be the Second Coming of Christ.
Archie Rice, an old-time British vaudeville performer sinking into final defeat, schemes to stay in show business.
