This post is part of The World War II Blogathon, hosted by Cinema Essentials and Maddy Loves Her Classic Films. See the other posts here. In A Canterbury Tale, Alison Smith (Sheila Sim), a Land Girl doing her bit in wartime Kent, goes for a walk on the Old Road pilgrims once travelled to Canterbury. […]
Cutlasses and Kilts: ‘The Master of Ballantrae’ (1953)
The Jacobite rising of 1745 was a disaster for much of Highland Scotland that led to the weakening of the traditional clan system and the Act of Proscription, which outlawed wearing the kilt, except as a soldier or officer in the British Army. The Master of Ballantrae, loosely based on Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel of […]
Crooked House: ‘Gaslight’ (1940)
This post is part of the 6th Annual Rule Britannia Blogathon, hosted by A Shroud of Thoughts. See the other posts here. In Gaslight, objects have a peculiar habit of going missing. A picture, a pocket-watch, a brooch—all seem to disappear into the bowels of the house and reappear where they ought not to be. […]
Rocket Men: ‘From the Earth to the Moon’ (1958) and ‘First Men in the Moon’ (1964)
Fifty years ago today, humanity first set foot on the moon. TCM has been celebrating with a month-long sci-fi festival, beginning with George Méliès’ A Trip to the Moon: one of the first science-fiction films ever made and over a century later, still one of the best. Alongside the robots, metropolises and things from another […]
Unmade Movies: ‘The Blind Man’ and ‘The Unquenchable Thirst of Dracula’
There are films I long to see and know I never will: Michael Powell’s Prospero; Orson Welles’ Heart of Darkness; Martin Scorsese’s Gershwin; Max Opühl’s The Duchess of Langeais. Film history is haunted by the spectres of unmade movies, films which for whatever reason—cast reshuffles, vagaries of financing—never saw the light of a projection booth. […]
The World of W. Somerset Maugham: ‘Quartet’ (1948), ‘Trio’ (1950) and ‘Encore’ (1951)
“In my twenties the critics said I was brutal, in my thirties they said I was flippant, in my forties they said I was cynical, in my fifties they said I was incompetent and then in my sixties they said I was superficial.” So speaks W. Somerset Maugham in his wry introduction to Quartet, an […]
From Page to Screen: Seven Films Set in Bookshops
Happy Independent Bookstore Day! Every last Saturday in April, since 2015, bookworms across the country have celebrated indie bookshops: marvellous, idiosyncratic creatures that these days feel like an endangered species. It’s a great excuse to buy books. Not that I’ve ever needed one. Glancing at my shelves, I’ve sometimes wondered if I’m in danger of […]
All That Money Can Buy: ‘The V.I.P.s’ (1963)
Ensconced in the lobby of Grand Hotel, Dr. Otternschlag famously observes: “People coming, going. Nothing ever happens.” The joke is of course that he’s wrong. The V.I.P.s is filled with people coming and going, specifically a group of passengers at a London airport en route to the US. We witness one tumultuous day in their […]
My Favourite Discoveries of 2018
As 2018 ticks to a close, time for one more list. These are my favourite discoveries of the year—films that aren’t new, but were new to me. Bells Are Ringing (1960) A musical featuring the combined talents of Judy Holliday, Dean Martin, Vincente Minnelli, Betty Comden and Adolph Green. This film is so easy to […]
Stranger in a Strange Land: ‘Local Hero’ (1983)
Local Hero is a fish-out-of-water comedy about an American oilman who travels to a tiny Scottish town and tries to do business with the locals. So far, so run-of-the-mill. But look again. Bill Forsyth’s film is also about the price we pay for progress, the emptiness lurking in seemingly full lives and the beauty of […]