Susannah York
As Australian cinema broke through to international audiences in the 1970s through respected art house films like Peter Weir's "Picnic At Hanging Rock," a new underground of low-budget exploitation filmmakers were turning out considerably less highbrow fare. Documentary filmmaker Mark Hartley explores this unbridled era of sex and violence, complete with clips from some of the scene's most outrageous flicks and interviews with the renegade filmmakers themselves.
Set between the parallel worlds of contemporary London and the futuristic faith dominated metropolis of Meanwhile City, Franklyn weaves a tale of four souls, whose lives are intertwined by fate, romance and tragedy. As these worlds collide, a single bullet determines the destiny of these four characters.
'A Guest of life' is inspired by the journey of Alexander Csoma de Koros. The eccentric 19th century set out from his native Transylvania to central Asia on foot, only taking his knowledge of 13 dead and spoken languages with him. He wanted to find the ancestors of the Hungarians, but once reaching Tibet he stayed there, compiling an English-Tibetan dictionary, translating and abridging Buddhist teachings and literature, including the Book of the Dead. The film however is not a biopic, but a collection of impressions of Tibet, recorded on an 8mm camera, overlaid with excerpts from Csoma's diary and translations, spoken on the many languages familiar to Csoma. Intercut with the documentary-style footage are animated segments, which tell Transylvanian folktales that have been weaved around the legendary figure of Csoma.
Sacha is an aging, well-established London 'male escort' with a select clientèle of weekly socialite ladies, such as baroness James, who expect an impeccable service he can only provide thanks to his in-living 'orderly', handsome 'clever Trevor', who moonlights as nude arts class model. Ben is a rising novice, who seeks their coaching. When Sasha makes a bad fall, Trevor must cover during his recovery, but jealous Sasha is far from grateful.
A 5-part documentary of the history of Superman in the movies. • Origin - Superman in the media and the challenges the Salkinds faced • Vision - Creating the right script, Choosing the right director and casting the right actors • Ascent - The production and launch of a new kind of fantasy film • Crisis - Complications and conflicts between the creative forces behind Superman II • Redemption - Criticisms and burnout of Superman III and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace
Young American Catherine Mulligan follows her love to Iran and converts to Islam. After being raped she is sentenced to death by stoning.
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.
Rachel discovers she is pregnant. Just as she is about to break the news to her stockbroker boyfriend Bill, he dumps her. Heartbroken and angry, Rachel takes Bill's cherished sports car, clears out their joint bank account and heads off to the country and to her dysfunctional family's farmhouse. By trying to sort out her own family's problems Rachel hopes to come to terms with her own predicament. But Bill discovers her whereabouts and is on the warpath.
Mike is a composer who dreams of creating symphonies but instead, dashes off jingles for TV commercials -- all the while pining over ex-girlfriend Helen. But Mike's life takes several unexpected turns when he meets Sara. After the two depart for an idyllic vacation together, Mike locates his mother (Susannah York), who, 35 years previous, had left his father. Writer-director Kevin W. Smith's feature-film directorial debut.
A princess from a Nordic European country is obligated to marry the boy her family chose. She escapes and discovers love in the arms of a beautiful swimming teacher.
Greg Sanderson is helping his wife, Jan, to recover from a nervous breakdown and revive their strained marriage. Their privacy is interrupted by the arrival of Greg's stunning and mysterious sister, Laura. Jan's paranoia deepens as she suspects that Greg's and her sister's relationship is too close. In her desperation, she confides her fears to the landlord but his weird reaction only creates more confusion.
A particularly vicious serial killer is stalking the Norfolk coast in the vicinity of the Larksoken nuclear power station. The press have branded him 'The Whistler' because witnesses have heard a hymn being whistled in the vicinity of the murders. His trademark is the letter 'L' carved on the forehead of his victims. L for Larksoken? At first, his victims seem to be chosen entirely at random - women in the wrong place at the wrong time - but then two women employed at the nuclear power station are murdered in quick succession...
The 20 January 1931 slaying of Julia Wallace remains unsolved, despite an ongoing stream of investigative writers giving an impression that a solution to the crime has been found through a surfeit of working hypotheses.
Gothic thriller about Old Martin who heeds the voice of Anna, who calls him back to the mountain cabin where he left her to die while she gave birth to their surviving son.
Art critic Krabbé, a German ex-pat living in London, is confronted by his radical 1960s past when he's asked to assassinate a Chilean murderer who is on a visit to London. Krabbé's anti-hero is spot on and his increasing struggle with his identity convincing. Engel's intelligent and visually engaging thriller breaks a few rules while still relishing the dynamics of the mystery genre. While the feel of Melancholia is generally downbeat, such a fresh and intelligent thriller is certainly something to celebrate.
Thirteen-year-old Nick and his slightly dense older brother Herbert run the Diamond Private Detective Agency above Camden Town Tube Station in north-central London. When a master criminal called The Falcon dies, they come into possession of his box of chocolate Maltesers, which contains the secret key to a fabulous cache of diamonds. Can they unravel the mystery and avoid the clutches of seedy lowlifes Brenda Von Falkenberg, Gott and Himmell, The Fat Man and the dogmatic Chief Inspector Snape, all of whom want to find the swag first.
A bittersweet tale of lost love, based on a short story ("The Apple Tree") by John Galsworthy.
A detective tries to track down a serial killer who is murdering prostitutes while at the same time having to deal with his girlfriend's mental problems, which are gradually deteriorating into a split personality.
They're two best friends, a million miles from home. On an incredible adventure, beyond the boundaries of space and time. A fantasy about a lonely boy who is transferred from his dull life with his adoptive parents to the land where his real father is the king.
11-year-old Nick moves into a large old house with his sisters Jennie and Clare, left in the care of Helga the Swedish au pair while their parents are away in America. Nick is unhappy at his new school, where he is befriended by a boy named Sam and intimidated by scripture teacher Mr. Crabb, who is interested in the occult and demonology. Nick hears voices in the house and receives messages on his computer screen; he also suffers inexplicable blisters on his feet and grazes on his elbows and knees. When he dreams of burning and wakes up in a bed full of ashes, Nick tells a psychiatrist that he feels he is possessed by a demon.
Lorraine Barrie, a fading but brilliant actress with a penchant for manipulating every theatrical endeavour to her best advantage, meets her match when she must trust her success to an equally willful stage director.
An old bitter miser who makes excuses for his uncaring nature learns real compassion when three ghosts visit him on Christmas Eve.
For years Yellowbeard had looted the Spanish Main, making men eat their lips and swallow their hearts. Caught and convicted for tax evasion, he's sentenced to 20 years in St. Victim's Prison for the Extremely Naughty. In a scheme to confiscate his fabulous treasure, the Royal Navy allows him to escape and follows him, where saucy tarts, lisping demigods and some awful puns and punishments await.
It's 1943 and the American Air Force has come to Market Weatherby, a small East Anglian town. The war weary British and the brash American GIs sometimes clash, but friendships are also forged.
Alice was sitting in the park one day. She sees a jogger called Rabbit. When she first meets him she thinks he's a jerk later she finds him nice and relaxing. She falls in love with him. He takes her to Queenie's party. Rabbit later finds out that Queenie wants to kill him. So Rabbit packs up to leave the country. When Alice finds this out she commits suicide which brings her into a fantasy world.
Ernie Anderson narrates this look at the making of Richard Donner's blockbuster 1978 film. Behind-the-scenes footage, as well as scenes from the film, reveal just how audiences were able to "believe a man can fly." This program features interviews with key cast and crew.
Harry and Sue Lewis met in the 40s as teenagers living in the Bronx. He was an aspiring architect, she was the most beautiful girl in school, and both had a fondness for bran muffins. They fell in love, got married, moved to Los Angeles, and had two kids. While struggling with his midlife crisis, Harry receives an invitation for his high school's reunion back so he takes Sue and their teenage kids on a cross-country car trip back to the Big Apple. Will they see in the Bronx what they expected? Will the good memories from their past help rekindle their fading love? Is it too late to dream?
Three escaped criminals from the planet Krypton test the Man of Steel's mettle. Led by General Zod, the Kryptonians take control of the White House and partner with Lex Luthor to destroy Superman and rule the world. But Superman, who attempts to make himself human in order to get closer to Lois, realizes he has a responsibility to save the planet.
When a British archaeologist violates an Egyptian queen's tomb, her evil spirit enters his daughter.
An elderly, venerable priest, goes over the Golden Gate bridge and everyone except his nurse, Sister Benecia, believes that it was suicide. Sister Benecia finally convices the police department to assign a dectective, the cynical, irascible Paul Silver, to investigate. The "Mad Nun" and the "Mad Cop" become a formidable investigative team -- and much, much more.
Toronto, Canada. A few days before Christmas, Miles Cullen, a bored teller working at a bank branch located in a shopping mall, accidentally learns that the place is about to be robbed when he finds a disconcerting note on one of the counters…
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.
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.
An old captain & his young wife share a lot of adventures after they're shipwrecked and captured by Aborigines on an island near Australia.
Robert Culp plays Bracken, whose life seems perfect until his wife Ellen and their children are kidnapped by terrorists one day. After failed attempts to capture them back by the police, Ellen's ex husband enters the fray and plans his own rescue attempt. James Coburn plays McCabe, Ellen's ex-husband who hires a crew of professional hang gliders to help him rescue her and the kids from the terrorist's mountain top lair.
A European arms dealer (Roger Moore) meets a liberated woman journalist (Susannah York), who is writing a story about the ridiculous things men do with the armaments during a NATO war games meeting. Needless to say, the two meet and make sparks. A rather simple love story ensues.
A company of British soldiers in colonial India is shaken when the widow of their most honored hero is assaulted. A young officer must defend a fellow lieutenant from the charges in an unusual court-martial, while investigating the deepening mystery behind the attack.
The venomous and amoral wife of a wealthy architect tries, any way she can, to break up the blossoming romance between her husband and his new mistress; a good-natured young widow who holds a dark past.
In this film we see how the members of a family react when the husband returns home, after he abandoned it seven years ago.
Jane Eyre is an orphan, sent to Lowood school, and eventually becomes a governess at Thornfield hall to a girl named Adele. While she is there, many strange things happen and eventually she and Edward Rochester, owner of Thornfeild and Adele's guardian, fall in love. Suddenly, when Jane is about to win the happiness she deserves, a dark secret comes to light, and it will take all of her courage, love and understanding to triumph.
In this British tragi-comedy taking place among emotionally bankrupt upper-class Scottish countrymen, Peter O'Toole plays Sir Charles Henry Arbuthnot Pinkerton Ferguson, a mentally disturbed Scotsman, living on his uncared-for farm, who also harbors an incestuous yearning for his sister Hilary (Susannah York), who is staying with Sir Charles after a fight with her husband Douglas (Michael Craig). An adaptation of James Kennaway's novel Household Ghosts.
Satire about the First World War based on a stage musical of the same name, portraying the "Game of War" and focusing mainly on the members of one family (last name Smith) who go off to war. Much of the action in the movie revolves around the words of the marching songs of the soldiers, and many scenes portray some of the more famous (and infamous) incidents of the war, including the assassination of Duke Ferdinand, the Christmas meeting between British and German soldiers in no-mans-land, and the wiping out by their own side of a force of Irish soldiers newly arrived at the front, after successfully capturing a ridge that had been contested for some time.
In the midst of the Great Depression, manipulative emcee Rocky enlists contestants for a dance marathon offering a $1,500 cash prize. Among them are a failed actress, a middle-aged sailor, a delusional blonde and a pregnant girl.
In 1940, the Royal Air Force fights a desperate battle against the might of the Luftwaffe for control of the skies over Britain, thus preventing the Nazi invasion of Britain.
When June Buckridge arrives at her London flat and announces 'They are going to murder me', her long-time lover and doll-cuddling flat mate Alice 'Childie' McNaught realizes that things are going to change. For June is referring to her character 'Sister George', a lovable nurse she portrays in a popular daytime serial. To make matters worse, the widowed executive at the BBC responsible for the decision to kill off Sister George - Mercy Croft is also a predatory lesbian who is after Childie and will stop at nothing to get what she wants.
Half-brothers Stefane and Antony despise their biological father, callous millionaire Charles Calvert. Because Charles refuses to share his wealth with his sons, Stefane and Antony ask hip American thrill-seeker Duffy to help steal the money they believe is their birthright. When Charles decides to move a large portion of his savings from Morocco to France, Duffy has an opportunity to stage a daring burglary attempt at sea.
Barney Lincoln is a rambling gambling man who scores sensational wins at poker and chemin de fer because he has succeeded in marking the original plates for the backs of all the playing cards manufactured in a plant in Geneva and used in all the gambling joints in Europe. In his gambling depredation, Barney is spotted by Angel McGinnis, the daughter of a Scotland Yard Inspector 'Manny' McGinnis on the lookout for a man to do a job. The inspector enlists Barney's help in playing poker with a shady London character whom Scotland Yard wants to force to financial ruin.
A depiction of the conflict between King Henry VIII of England and his Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas More, who refuses to swear the Oath of Supremacy declaring Henry Supreme Head of the Church in England.
A diverse group of individuals struggle to survive in the Kalahari desert after their passenger plane crashes.
An actress dressed as a nun flounces off a film set and has a series of encounters on the streets of London.
Political and personal intrigues surround a group of characters in Malaya, after the close of the Second World War.
TV adaptation of the Oscar Wilde play. Jack pretends to be his foolish younger brother, Ernest in order to be a model of moral rectitude to his young ward, Cecily. And he intends to propose to Gwendolyn--that is until he discovers that she loves him because his name is Ernest.
This pseudo-biographical movie depicts 5 years from 1885 on in the life of the Viennan psychologist Freud (1856-1939). At this time, most of his colleagues refuse to cure hysteric patients, because they believe they're just simulating to gain attention. But Freud learns to use hypnosis to find out the reasons for the psychosis. His main patient is a young woman who refuses to drink water and is plagued by a recurring nightmare.
Sensitive story of a British girl's awakening from childhood into life and love on vacation in France.
Following World War II in peacetime Scotland, brigade headquarters replaces commanding officer Major Jock Sinclair, a boisterous battalion leader, with the strict, temperamental Lieutenant Colonel Basil Barrow. Resentful toward his replacement, Sinclair undermines Barrow's authority and damages his successor's reputation among the soldiers. Barrow faces an uphill battle in regaining the discipline and respect of his battalion.
When a law-abiding demolition expert is duped by a gang of criminals into helping them he is caught and jailed. When he is released he goes straight and then notices a leading citizen in his town is cheating his neighbours.
