Scrooge (1951)
Apr 16, 1999Miser's Redemption
This is usually regarded as one of the best versions of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, a British-made production starring Alistair Sim
Michael Hordern
How I Won the War (1967)
Mar 18, 2003WWII Absurdist Black Comedy
A World War II comedy from Richard Lester that heads into a wild absurdism, a film that is both brilliant and numbingly noisy. Most did not get the surreal blacker-than-black tone and the film was not a success
The Bed Sitting Room (1969)
Jun 8, 2001Post-Holocaust Absurdist Comedy
Richard Lester adapts an absurdist Spike Milligan play set in the aftermath of the nuclear holocaust where the survivors are mutating into animals and items of furniture. A film with a really bizarre sense of humour that most at the time did not get
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1972)
May 6, 1999Alice in Wonderland Adaptation
A live-action film adaptation of Alice in Wonderland that conducts a passable run through of Lewis Carroll with the supporting characters populated by an all-star British cast
The Pied Piper (1972)
Dec 3, 2019Fairytale Adaptation
The first dark adult fairytale. Before this, fairytales on film had been in the realm of Disney. This roots the familiar tale in an historical reality surrounded by the Black Death, The Inquisition and Anti-Semitism
Demons of the Mind (1972)
Dec 16, 2000Family Madness and Victorian Psychology/Hammer Film
This is one of the rare failures from Hammer Films, a not uninteresting work set during the early era of 19th Century psychology and directed with some vivid effect
Theater of Blood (1973)
Nov 5, 2000Mad Shakespearean Actor's Revenge
Following on from the success of the Dr Phibes films, Vincent Price is cast as a mad Shakespearean actor who employs comically grotesque deaths from Shakespeare's plays to kill his critics
The Slipper and the Rose (1976)
Dec 24, 2002Cinderella Adaptation
A musical adaptation of Cinderella from the Sherman Brothers, behind the hit of Mary Poppins
Watership Down (1978)
Apr 7, 2003Animation/Talking Rabbit Quest
Neglected today, this adaptation of Richard Adams' classic novel about a quest among rabbits was one of the finest animated films of its era. This is frequently heartbreaking and touches on darker emotions that Disney and most other family films regularly sanitise.
The Green Man (1990)
May 22, 2018Literary Ghost Story
Adapted from a Kingsley Amis novel, this BBC mini-series is a ghost story for arts audiences. Albert Finney is great as a philandering hotelier who must deal with the appearances of an 18th Century sorcerer