Stephen Frears

An in-depth look of the 40 year journey, from post-war Germany to Hollywood royalty, of Hans Zimmer, the man who’s become the dominant force in the world of movie soundtracks. His film credits include The Lion King, Rain Man, Pirates of The Caribbean, Gladiator, The Dark Knight, Batman Begins, 12 Year A Slave, The Thin Red Line, The Da Vinci Code and Dune.

Ellen & Scott are facing the end of a long marriage when Ellen decides they should seek marital counseling to facilitate an amicable divorce.

When television producer Paul Smith puts everything on the line to make ITV quiz show and overnight sensation `Who Wants to be a Millionaire?', one family's much-loved pub quiz hobby turns into outright obsession.

Director Stephen Frears, film historian Ian Christie, and author and British film historian Richard Dacre discuss the unique qualities of The Man in the White Suit as well as the legacy of its director, Alexander Mackendrick.

Chris Wade's documentary film is a personal, intimate and affectionate look at the life and work of Lindsay Anderson, the legendary film and theatre director behind if. - and O Lucky Man. With new recollections from director Stephen Frears, if - star David Wood, plus actor and friend Brian Pettifer, Memories of Lindsay Anderson paints a portrait of a stubborn, self assured artist, an anti establishment non conformist who refused to play the game, and a private man who, though on the surface seemed confident, held his emotional cards close to his chest. This is an in depth study of one of our most brilliant yet undervalued filmmakers.

5.3/10

Louise and Tom meet in a pub immediately before their weekly marital therapy session. Each meeting pieces together how their lives were, what drew them together, and what has started to pull them apart.

A feature length documentary about the real state of the British film industry in relation to UK structures past, present and currently for the future. This film exposes the shocking truths about the UK Governments' will to grow an indigenous British film industry, the legacy and testament of the now closed UK Film Council (UKFC), the current British Film Institute and the new Creative England.

It's the late 1960s, homosexuality has only just been legalised and Jeremy Thorpe, the leader of the Liberal party, has a secret he's desperate to hide.

7.7/10
9.7%

A brand new feature-length documentary on the film’s production, including new interviews with director Stephen Frears, director of photography Oliver Stapleton, editor Michael Audsley, executive producer Barbara Defina and co-producer Peggy Rajaki.

Alexandre Desplat is one of the most famous film music composer of today. Innovative artist with a singular expression, he is the successor of french masters of film music: Georges Delerue, Antoine Duhamel, Maurice Jarre. Writing music for films gather his two passions: music and cinema. Between working sessions, confidences, films and personnal archives, Alexandre Desplat offers, through this documentary, a great record on the creative process and today’s cinema.

7.5/10

Queen Victoria strikes up an unlikely friendship with a young Indian clerk named Abdul Karim.

6.8/10
6.6%

She's chic, slim and sexy like Brigitte Bardot. She's French. But she's not all French women, right?

The story of Florence Foster Jenkins, a New York heiress, who dreamed of becoming an opera singer, despite having a terrible singing voice.

6.8/10
8.8%

An Irish sports journalist becomes convinced that Lance Armstrong's performances during the Tour de France victories are fueled by banned substances. With this conviction, he starts hunting for evidence that will expose Armstrong.

6.5/10
6.2%

French Cinema Mon Amour is an ensemble film in which each contributor brings their own voice, their own particular approach, their culture, and their language to produce a portrait of French cinema.

7/10

Stephen Frears in a interview with film scholar and producer Colin MacCabe. The topics which he touches upon include his career in theater and TV prior to making the film, his impressions of Hanif Kureishi, his relative ignorance of immigrant life and the world he was unwittingly stepping into, the impact of the release of the film, and plenty more.

Thirteen filmmakers talk about Henri Langlois and their relationship with him.

When Allied forces liberated the Nazi concentration camps in 1944-45, their terrible discoveries were recorded by army and newsreel cameramen, revealing for the first time the full horror of what had happened. Making use of British, Soviet and American footage, the Ministry of Information’s Sidney Bernstein (later founder of Granada Television) aimed to create a documentary that would provide lasting, undeniable evidence of the Nazis’ unspeakable crimes. He commissioned a wealth of British talent, including editor Stewart McAllister, writer and future cabinet minister Richard Crossman – and, as treatment advisor, his friend Alfred Hitchcock. Yet, despite initial support from the British and US Governments, the film was shelved, and only now, 70 years on, has it been restored and completed by Imperial War Museums under its original title "German Concentration Camps Factual Survey".

8/10
10%

Muhammad Ali’s historic Supreme Court battle from behind closed doors. When Ali was drafted into the Vietnam War at the height of his boxing career, his claim to conscientious objector status led to a controversial legal battle that rattled the U.S. judicial system right up to the highest court in the land.

6.7/10
3.8%

A woman searches for her adult son, who was taken away from her decades ago when she was forced to live in a convent.

7.6/10
9%

A former stripper's talent with numbers lands her a job with a professional gambler who runs a sports book in Las Vegas.

4.8/10
1.8%

Sam was born with an extremely rare genetic disorder called Familial Dysautonomia. When born, he had 50 per cent chance of making it to his fifth birthday. Now, at the age of 39 we follow this exceptional person as he pursues his joint goals of getting his acting career back on track and finding love.

7.8/10

Documentary about Hans Zimmer.

7.2/10

A young newspaper writer returns to her hometown in the English countryside, where her childhood home is being prepped for sale.

6.2/10
6.5%

A sumptuous dramatic comedy set in late 19th Century France, during the Belle Epoque, a period of social and cultural excess in European upper classes which ended only as the First World War erupted.

6.2/10
5.1%

Features conversations with ten of the world's greatest living directors: Bernardo Bertolucci, David Lynch, Liliana Cavani, Stephen Frears, Agnes Varda, Ken Loach, Todd Haynes, Catherine Breillat, Richard Linklater and John Sayles. The film documents Ismailos' voyage of discovering the creative personalities behind the camera.

6.4/10

Documentary about the making of Alfred Hitchcock's 1946 film NOTORIOUS.

Documentary on the history of gay and lesbian film.

6.6/10

The Queen is an intimate behind the scenes glimpse at the interaction between HM Elizabeth II and Prime Minister Tony Blair during their struggle, following the death of Diana, to reach a compromise between what was a private tragedy for the Royal family and the public's demand for an overt display of mourning.

7.3/10
9.6%

Eccentric 70-year-old widow purchases the Windmill Theatre in London as a post-widowhood hobby. After starting an innovative continuous variety review, which is copied by other theaters, they begin to lose money. Mrs Henderson suggests they add female nudity similar to the Moulin Rouge in Paris

7/10
6.7%

A program of short films from some of the cinema's greatest diectors. Curated by Emir Kusturica and Stephen Frears. - George Lucas "1.42.08 to Qualify" (1966) - Ridley Scott "A Boy and a Bicycle" (1965) - Robert Zemeckis "The Lift" (1972) - Tony Scott "One of the Missing" (1969) - Emir Kusturica "Guernica" (1978) - Luc Besson "L'avant dernier" (1981) - Lars von Trier "Nocturne" (1980) - Terry Gilliam "Storytime" (1968) - Paul Verhoeven "A Lizzard Too Much" (1960) - Roman Polanski "Le gros et le maigre" (1960) - Jane Campion "Peel" (1982) - Stephen Frears "The Burning" (1967)

A documentary about film director Lindsay Anderson, made for BBC Scotland television series "Artworks Scotland."

Episode of the BBC Scotland television series focusing on Lindsay Anderson's 1968 film "If...", featuring interviews with star Malcolm McDowell, cinematographer Miroslav Ondříček, assistant editor Ian Rakoff, director’s assistant Stephen Frears, producer Michael Medwin, and screenwriter David Sherwin

7.7/10

As a traveler searches for a place called Confidence, he keeps running into other versions of himself.

7.9/10

It is approaching an election in the UK when the leader of the Labour party, John Smith, suffers another in a line of heart attacks and dies. With the leadership campaign about to start the clear choice appears to be Gordon Brown, a stanch Scotsman. However Tony Blair is also beginning to appear more likely as he will appeal to Southern voters who would be turned off by Brown. Blair rings Brown to arrange a meeting to discuss which will go for the job. The film flashbacks to the start of their relationship, sharing an office in Westminster on their first seats.

7/10

An urban hotel in London is a gathering and flash point for legal and illegal immigrants attempting to cobble together their lives in a new country. The immigrants include Senay, a Turkish woman, and a Nigerian doctor named Okwe who is working as a night porter at the hotel. The pair discover the hotel is a front for all sorts of clandestine activities. Their only wish is to avoid possible deportation. Okwe becomes more entangled in the goings on when he is called to fix a toilet in one of the rooms. He discovers the plumbing has been clogged by a human heart.

7.3/10
9.4%

Robert Altman interviewed during the making of GOSFORD PARK (2001), as well as members of the cast and crew. Also, revealing behind the scenes footage and information about his career leading up to this feature.

7.6/10

Cold War tensions climb to a fever pitch when a U.S. bomber is accidentally ordered to drop a nuclear warhead on Moscow.

7.3/10

When record store owner Rob Gordon gets dumped by his girlfriend, Laura, because he hasn't changed since they met, he revisits his top five breakups of all time in an attempt to figure out what went wrong. As Rob seeks out his former lovers to find out why they left, he keeps up his efforts to win Laura back.

7.5/10
9.1%

A morality tale of xenophobia, religious prejudice, mob violence, poverty, and their effect on two children in Liverpool during the Depression. When a shipyard closes, Liam and Teresa's dad loses his job. Liam, who's about 8, making his first Holy Communion, gets a regular dose of fire and brimstone at church. Teresa, about 13, has a job as a maid to the Jewish family that owns the closed shipyard. The lady of that house is having an affair, and Teresa becomes an accomplice. Liam stutters terribly, especially when troubled. Dad comes under the sway of the Fascists, who blame cheap Irish labor and Jewish owners. A Molotov cocktail brings things to a head.

6.9/10
7%

British film-maker Alan Clarke was championed by the likes of Gary Oldman, Tim Roth and Ray Winstone - Stephen Frears even called him the best. And yet Clarke only ever made 3 feature films. This documentary explores the life and career of an exceptional director - Alan Clarke.

6.8/10

An intimate story of the enduring bond of friendship between two hard-living men, set against a sweeping backdrop: the American West, post-World War II, in its twilight. Pete and Big Boy are masters of the prairie, but ultimately face trickier terrain: the human heart.

6.1/10
5.4%

The true story of Stephanie Slater, a British estate agent who was kidnapped, raped, and held for ransom by Michael Sams, who imprisoned her in a coffin-like box for eight days.

6.2/10

Set in "Barrytown", a fictitious working-class quarter of Dublin. "Bimbo" Reeves gets laid off from his job. With his redundancy, he buys a van and sells fish and chips with his buddy Larry. Due to Ireland's surprising success at the 1990 FIFA World Cup, their business starts off well, but the relationship between the two friends soon becomes strained as Bimbo behaves more like a typical boss.

6.7/10
3.8%

A housemaid falls in love with Dr. Jekyll and his darkly mysterious counterpart, Mr. Hyde.

5.8/10
2.6%

Stephen Frears and a quartet of film industry notables - representing different cinematic periods - drink tea and discuss ups and downs of British cinema.

6.6/10

Set in Ireland, Sharon Curley is a 20 year old living with her parents and many brothers and sisters. When she gets herself pregnant and refuses to name the father, she becomes the talk of the town.

7.3/10
9.7%

Bernie Laplante is having a rough time. He's divorced, his ex-wife hates him and has custody of their son, the cops are setting a trap for him, then to top it all, he loses a shoe whilst rescuing passengers of a crashed jet. Being a thief who is down on his luck, Bernie takes advantage of the crash, but then someone else claims credit for the rescue.

6.5/10
6.5%

Documentary - Alan Clarke's films exposed a real, raw world as no other films have. Works such as "Scum," "Made in Britain," "The Firm," "Rita, Sue and Bob Too" and "Elephant" inspired a generation of British actors, writers and directors that changed cinema forever. This documentary features rare behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with friends and colleagues of Clarke, including Tim Roth, Danny Boyle, Stephen Frears, Ray Winstone and Phil Daniels. -

7.2/10

A young short-con grifter suffers both injury and the displeasure of reuniting with his criminal mother, all the while dating an unpredictable young lady.

6.9/10
9.1%

In 18th century France, Marquise de Merteuil asks her ex-lover Vicomte de Valmont to seduce the future wife of another ex-lover of hers in return for one last night with her. Yet things don’t go as planned.

7.6/10

A couple of bored escorts find themselves suddenly involved with a hit-gang and an ax-murderer - Mr. Jolly. Gratuitous violence, rivers of blood and maximum hilarity, all rolled into one.

8.9/10

Sammy and Rosie are an unconventional middle-class London married couple. They live in the midst of inner-city chaos, surround themselves with intellectual street people, and sleep with everybody - except each other! Things become interesting when Sammy's father, Rafi, who is a former Indian government minister, comes to London for a visit. Sammy, Rosie, and Rafi try to find meaning through their lives and loves.

6.6/10
8%

Stephen Frears directs this biographical drama focusing on controversial British playwright Joe Orton, revealed in flashback after his murder by lover Kenneth Halliwell. Born in 1933 in Leicester, in the English Midlands, John 'Joe' Orton moves to London in 1951, to study at RADA, and enjoys an openly gay relationship with Halliwell in their famous Islington flat in the 1960s. However, when Orton achieves spectacular success with such plays as 'What the Butler Saw' and 'Loot', Halliwell begins to feel alienated and the pair's future looks increasingly uncertain.

7.3/10
9.4%

Scottish Television's film on the 40th Edinburgh International Film Festival in 1986, starring Robbie Coltrane (a former EIFF chauffeur) and featuring interviews with Bill Forsyth, Samuel Fuller and Barry Norman, among many others.

6.3/10

A man with learning difficulties suffers neglect and ill-treatment, and this is only exasperated when his parents die and nobody seems to know what to do with him. A sequel to this film, titled "Walter and June", was released in 1983 and set 19 years later in time. In the United States, these two are sometimes bundled together under the title "Loving Walter".

7.6/10

As the Lady Chatterley court case puts its seal on the 1950s, three boys set out for a day's train-spotting. They see more than just trains, though, on a day when innocence and illusion are lost.

8.3/10

A look at the career of Oscar-winning cameraman Chris Menges. Filmed on location of 'Comfort and Joy'. Chris Menges discusses his early career in television and film. Featuring interviews with Bill Forsyth, Bill Paterson, Ken Loach, Neil Jordan, and Jeremy Isaacs.

A British-Pakistani man renovates a rundown laundrette with his male lover while dealing with drama within his family, the local Pakistani community, and a persistent mob of skinheads.

6.8/10
9.7%

Ex-gangster Willie Parker has betrayed his former "colleagues" and now lives in Spain where he thinks he can hide from their vengeance...

7/10
8.5%

Newly widowed Etta visits her beloved Aunt M and discovers her bedridden and listless. Etta's struggle to restore her aunt's dignity and cheer brings renewed meaning to the lives of both women, but also reveals family secrets and forces confrontations with her aunt's indifferent son and hostile daughter-in-law.

7.9/10

The year is 1974, and Barbara Dean (Judi Dench), a British assistant manager in a foreign bank in Saigon, begins a relationship with American Bob Chesneau (Frederic Forrest). She quickly realises that he works for the CIA and he knows that the fall of South Vietnam is very near.

6/10

Sequel to the TV film "Walter". In the United States, the two films have been released together on DVD as a package, called "Loving Walter".

7.7/10

The Comic Strip is a group of British comedians, who came to prominence in the 1980s. They are known for their television series The Comic Strip Presents... which was labelled as an example of alternative comedy. The core members are Adrian Edmondson, Dawn French, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Peter Richardson, Jennifer Saunders and Alexei Sayle with frequent appearances by Keith Allen, Robbie Coltrane and others.

7.9/10

Play about two elderly cancer patients suffering in hospital.

8/10

The slender premise springs from the actions of two listless 11-year-old boys, the cold, manipulative Leo, and his weaker, more impressionable friend, Mike. Contemptuous of the fallible police force (Mike has already filched a police hat from an accident scene), the boys arrange a staged knife fight outside a football stadium with the aid of a bag of stage blood and a real blade.

6.2/10

Lee, a Chinese man, works as a waiter in a hotel in England, despite speaking very little English. Told that a girl called Iris might be interested in him, on his afternoon off work he buys a box of chocolates and sets off to find her.

7.3/10

Alan Bennett's play about the mid-life crisis of an estate agent.

8.3/10

Play For Today written by and starring Neville Smith. Christian Harvey , a local radio DJ and ageing rocker, is an obsessive fan of Elvis and the news of Elvis's death is for him a personal tragedy as well as the end of an era.

8.2/10

A series of pink forms has Doris and Doreen fearing for their cushy jobs.

7.4/10

A budding Scottish film producer tries to get his ambitious Aberdeen-set western financed, and while he attracts some major stars and directors to the film he finds that with their support come more and more script changes... Filmed around the 1977 Edinburgh Film Festival, Long Shot is a deadpan satire about the trials and tribulations of British independent filmmaking, with terrific cameos from Wim Wenders, Susannah York, Stephen Frears, Alan Bennett and John Boorman.

5.9/10

Arthur Dodsworth has recently retired. He lives alone except for his budgie and memories of his late wife Winnie. One afternoon his nap is interrupted by the doorbell; his former secretary, Peggy Prothero, has come to visit. A brash, charmless woman who seems to take no pleasure in anything but putting people down, Miss Prothero wants to fill her old boss in on all the changes that have taken place at work since he left. Dodsworth isn't very curious, and as the visit wears on it puts a little strain on his politeness and patience. Miss Prothero doesn't enjoy it much either, but lingers on as there's a bombshell she wants to drop. The docketing system Dodsworth introduced thirty years earlier, which revolutionised the firm, has been scrapped by her adored new boss Mr Skinner. The crowning achievement of Dodsworth's career has just become obsolete, and she wants to tell him all about it.

7.1/10

A day in the life of a timid English literature professor.

8/10

A bittersweet drama on a familiar theme - the frictions forced to the surface during a Christmas family get-together - Michael Abbensetts' Black Christmas is an understated and affecting study of relationships, unexpressed pain and a tormented nostalgia for a distant home.

5.9/10

Kevin's wife walked out, and left him holding the baby. No sleep, dirty nappies - and a career in pop music at risk. And ahead lies a visit to the clinic. Will Kevin succeed as a mother?

One hot June day, three friends decide there is nothing they would like to do more than to get away from London. A boating holiday with lots of fresh air and exercise would be just the very thing, or so their doctors tell them. So, after debating the merits of hotel or camp beds and what to pack, they set off on their voyage - a trip up the Thames from Henley to Oxford - but very quickly find themselves ill-equipped for the trials of riverbank life. Comedy drama written by Tom Stoppard (based on the novel by Jerome K Jerome). Stars Michael Palin, Tim Curry and Stephen Moore.

7.2/10

A married couple, after a life time of work and bringing up a family, retire and awaken to the fast changing world around them, the habitual nature of their relationship, and what they have left.

7.9/10

Chance has missed the match, but the girls at his sister's wedding might make up for it

Alan Bennett's debut play for television follows the members of a Halifax cycling club, on an outing from Halifax to the ruins of Fountains Abbey. Set in the summer of 1911 and projects an idyllic vision of Edwardian England .

7.5/10

A would be private eye gets mixed up in a smuggling case.

6.5/10
10%

Follyfoot is a children's television series co-produced by the majority-partner British television company Yorkshire Television and the independent West German company TV Munich. It aired in the United Kingdom between 1971 and 1973, repeated for two years after that and again in the late 1980s. The series starred Gillian Blake in the lead role. Notable people connected with the series were actors Desmond Llewelyn and Arthur English and directors Jack Cardiff, Stephen Frears, Michael Apted and David Hemmings. It was originally inspired by Monica Dickens' 1963 novel Cobbler's Dream; she later wrote four further books in conjunction with the series—Follyfoot in 1971, Dora at Follyfoot in 1972, The Horses of Follyfoot in 1975, and Stranger at Follyfoot in 1976.

7.8/10

The Burning is Stephen Frears’ first film, a chilling exploration of racial tensions in Apartheid-era South Africa. On a sweltering summer’ day, a wealthy white matriarch insists on taking her household on a planned trip to the country, in spite of their urgent warnings that an uprising is underway.

6.1/10

Morgan, an aggressive and self-admitted dreamer, a fantasist who uses his flights of fancy as refuge from external reality, where his unconventional behavior lands him in a divorce from his wife, Leonie, trouble with the police and, ultimately, incarceration in a lunatic asylum.

6.7/10
6.7%

In 2012, having been lost for over 500 years, the remains of King Richard III were discovered beneath a carpark in Leicester. The search had been orchestrated by an amateur historian, Philippa Langley, whose unrelenting research had been met with incomprehension by her friends and family and with scepticism by experts and academics. THE LOST KING is the life-affirming true story of a woman who refused to be ignored and who took on the country's most eminent historians, forcing them to think again about one of the most infamous kings in England's history.

The story of one year within the walls of the palace of an authoritarian regime as it begins to unravel.

7.1/10

A 1976 play concerning an unemployed school leaver becomes involved with professional car thieves. Part of the ITV Playhouse strand.

7/10
7.8%

Part coming-of-age story, part true-life portrait of the beloved Billy Wilder, the film is set during the summer of 1977, when an innocent young woman begins working for the famed director and his screenwriter Iz Diamond on a Greek island during the filming of Fedora.