Summer in New York and the streets are baking. Luckily, the Quad has been offering film buffs air-conditioned refuge, plus chills of a different kind: a series dedicated to Hammer, the British studio synonymous with Gothic horror. Founded in 1934, Hammer Film Productions churned out mysteries and adaptations of radio serials before finding its niche […]
The Walk to the Paradise Garden: ‘A Month in the Country’ (1987)
As the hundredth anniversary of the Armistice approaches the First World War slips further away. The last veterans are gone. A collective memory of trenches, poppies, lions led by donkeys, and Rupert Brooke giving way to Wilfred Owen remains. Yet the Great War, fought by those who never imagined there would be a greater one, […]
Songs of Enchantment: ‘The Tales of Hoffmann’ (1951)
The Tales of Hoffmann exists in defiance of the commonplace. Steeped in magic, bright with beauty, it explodes like a flare, dazzling you with colour and sound. You emerge dazed and longing to see it all over again. Only Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger could have made it. In the 1940s and ‘50s Powell and […]
The Riddle Called Married Life: ‘Two for the Road’ (1967)
Two for the Road begins with a love affair gone sour then cycles back to when it began, skipping back and forth in time and through different phases: flirtation, rancour, complacency and newly-wedded bliss. The film is a non-linear slide into heartache. Driving through a small town, Mark (Albert Finney) and Joanna Wallace (Audrey Hepburn) […]
A Shortlist of Films I Wish Were in the Criterion Collection
The biannual Barnes and Noble Criterion Collection sale is now on. Or as I like to think of it, Christmas in July. Founded in 1984 the Criterion Collection, as the back of each of its DVDs and Blu-rays will tell you, is “a continuing series of important classic and contemporary films.” It’s a bespoke label […]
A Few Words on Robert Donat
He was one of the biggest stars in British cinema, but only made 19 films. He was celebrated for his beautiful speaking voice, but suffered from crippling asthma. He made his name playing dashing heroes, but is now best remembered for his performance as a shy schoolteacher. He might be the finest actor Britain ever […]
A Spot of Murder: ‘Evil Under the Sun’ (1982)
Take an all-star cast, stick them in an exotic location and have one of them drop dead. Voila, you have the basic ingredients of the Lavish Agatha Christie Production, a peculiarly English brand of murder-mystery that in the seventies and early eighties brought us death on a train in Murder on the Orient Express, death […]
Love and Other Drugs: ‘Burton and Taylor’ (2013)
In the final scene of Burton and Taylor, the BBC’s recent television film about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, the pair share a mournful tête-a-tête in Taylor’s dressing room. “We’re addicts Elizabeth, you and I,” he says. “Love is not a drug,” she counters, wearily. “Isn’t it? I don’t know,” he replies. Burton and Taylor […]
Tales of Terror: ‘The Haunting’ (1963), ‘Dead of Night’ (1945) and ‘Cat People’ (1942)
Horror thrives on explicit shock, terror on lingering disquiet and dread. This in essence is Ann Radcliffe’s famous distinction between fright and fear. Mrs. Radcliffe was the undisputed mistress of Gothic fiction- when it comes to spooky and scary, I consider her an expert. The Haunting, Dead of Night and Cat People have a few […]
Arabian Nights (and Days): ‘The Thief of Bagdad’ (1940)
Hands up, what was the last good fantasy film you saw? I mean a movie which truly thrilled you, transported you to another world and filled you with endless wonder. Was it The Lord of the Rings trilogy? Stardust? How about the Chronicles of Narnia or (some) instalments of the Harry Potter franchise? Fantasy is […]