Get your sickbags out - Norman Wisdom is saving an orphanage! Only a true fan could like this one. It's only his second star film but already his fondness for sickly pathos is becoming unbearable. The only decent bit is a chase in a toy car, and that's nicked from George Formby's Spare a Copper by the same director.
Script: Maurice Cowan, John Paddy Carstairs, Ted Willis
Director: John Paddy Carstairs
Players: Joan Rice, Shirley Abicair, Thora Hird, William Russell
Patricia Roc gets involved with Italian singer Nino Martini in this slight musical comedy. The script by Brahms and Simon just about keeps it going.
Script: Caryl Brahms, S.J. Simon
Director: Terence Young
Players: Bonar Colleano, Guy Middleton, Stanley Holloway, Hugh Wakefield, Charles Goldner, Irene Worth, Wily Feuter, Miles Malleson, Richard Hearne, Stuart Latham, Judith Furse, Brian Worth, Christopher Lee
Powell and Pressburger's tale of a bomber crew forced to bale out over occupied Holland. It gets a bit preachy as it wears on but it's fairly effective propaganda and worth comparing to the duo's latter 49th Parallel and its tale of Germans trying to cross Canada.
Written, produced and Directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
Players: Hugh Burden, Eric Portman, Hugh Williams, Godfrey Tearle, Bernard Miles, Emrys Jones, Googie Withers, Pamela Brown, Joyce Redman, Hay Petrie, Arnold Marle, Robert Helpmann, Peter Ustinov, Alec Clunes, Roland Culver, John Salew
The POW film with a difference with Hardy Kruger as Franz Von Werra - the only German to escape from the allies in WWII. It's also one of the best of the genre and you'll be rooting for Kruger despite knowing what he's going back to fight for.
Script adapt.: Howard Clewes. (o.a. Kendal Burt, James Leasor)
Director: Roy Baker
Players: Michael Goodliffe, Terence Alexander, Andrew Faulds, Alec McCowan, George Roubicek, Frederick Jaeger, Richard Marner, Stratford Johns, Glyn Houston
After learning he is to be forcibly retired, the Night Manager of a hotel cum nightclub has to get through his last night in the job.
Fast-moving drama with a fine central performance from Frank Vosper.
Script: Gerrard Farlie. (o.a. John Channelor)
Director: George Pearson
Players: Frank Vosper, Margaret Vines, Lewis Shaw, Leslie Perrins, Gillian Lind, Colin Keith-Johnson, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Michael Shepley
Thriller set in 1940. The British try to liberate diamonds from an Amsterdam vault before the Germans get to the city.
Interesting docu-drama, both glum and sentimental, but with enough action to keep things going.
Script adapt.: Michael McCarthy, John Eldridge. (o.a. David E. Walker)
Director: Michael McCarthy
Players: Peter Finch, Eva Bartok, Tony Britton, Alexander Knox, Malcolm Keen, Melvyn Hayes
Wartime comedy with Barbara Murrey and Donald Sinden as husband and wife. She arrives at her new A.T.S. posting to find that her husband is her superior officer with a reputation as a lady-killer. They keep their relationship secret because she wants to keep an eye on him.
The women of the A.T.S. are depicted as a bunch of glamour girls, more interested in painting their fingernails than fighting the war. They're just fluffy, brainless girlies who can't possibly handle a man's job; or if they are competent, they are manly, humourless monsters. When they finally manage to shoot down a German plane they abandon their posts to chase after the hunky pilot. If this film had been made during the war, its makers wouldn't have dared be so damn patronising. Naunton Wayne as the stern commander is miscast and his female equivalent, Fabia Drake, is underused. This comedy is a laugh-free zone.
Script: Anne Burnaby, Rupert Lang, Gilbert Gunn
Director: Gilbert Gunn
Players: Carole Lesley, Ronald Shiner, Dora Bryan, John Cairney, Joan Rice, Daniel Massey, Peter Jones, Ambrosine Phillpotts, Marianne Stone, Amanda Barrie
A surgeon is forced to operate on a mystery patient.
Typical Francis Durbridge thriller, given a bit of a lift by decent direction.
Script adapt.: John Guillermin, A.R. Rawlinson. (o.a. Francis Durbridge)
Director: John Guillermin
Players: Guy Rolfe, Lisa Daniely, Patricia Dainton, Sydney Tafler, Brian Worth, Anton Diffring, Ballard Berkley, Edward Dain, James Raglan, Michael Golden, Avice Landone, Eric Berry, Ann Bennett, Jean Hardwicke, Alexis Chesnakov
When a reporter finds an oracle at the bottom of an Irish well many people find a use for it.
Decent enough bit of Oirish whimsy, but no big deal.
Script: Patrick Campbell
Director: C. Pennington Richards
Players: Michael Medwin, Robert Beatty, Mervyn Johns, Virginia McKenna, Joseph Tomelty, Gillian Lind, Ursula Howells, Arthur Macrae, Louise Hampton, John Charlesworth, Maire O'Neill, Lockwood West, John McBride, Derek Tansley, Patrick McAlinney, Lionel Marson, Jean St. Claire, Jack May, Gilbert Harding
A man with a temper has to play golf with his boss in order to gain a promotion and win the girl.
Well-mounted short comedy based on a PG Wodehouse story.
Director: Andrew P Wilson
Players: Harry Beasley, Edwin Underhill, Jean Jay, Moore Marriott, Jack Rowell
Film company uses an army camp to make their latest film.
Not terribly funny, despite the talent involved.
Script adapt.: Donald Taylor, Geoffrey Orme, Eric Sykes. (o.a. Ian Hay)
Director: David Paltenghi
Players: Brian Reece, Margot Graham, Raymond Huntley, Sidney James, Tony Hancock, Peter Sellers, Clive Morton, June Thorburn, Maureen Swanson, Peter Martyn, Bill Fraser, Edward Lexy, Barry Mackay, Donald Pleasence, Eric Sykes, Michael Trubshaw, Reggie Hearne, Barry Steele, Maureen Pryor, Mark Baker, Stephen Vercoe
A British army camp is disrupted by the arrival of an American film unit.
Enjoyable comedy with Hollywood imports James Gleason and Charlotte Greenwood.
Script adapt: Leslie Arliss, Sidney Gilliat, James Gleason, (o.a) Ian Hay; (o.a. Anthony Armstrong)
Director: Walter Forde
Players: Jackie Gleason, Charlotte Greenwood, Ian Hunter, Ray Milland, Donald Calthrop, Cyril Maude, Jane Carr, Eliot Makeham, Hay Plumb, Wally Patch, Finlay Currie, Percy Parsons, Edwin Lawrence, Glennis Lorimer, Sydney Keith, Jane Cornell
Paul Massie plays the assassin on the trail of a Resistance traitor. Gripping character study which examines the line between war and murder.
Script: Paul Dehn, George St. George
Director: Anthony Asquith
Players: James Robertson Justice, Lillian Gish, Eddie Albert, Leslie French, John Crawford, Lionel Jeffries, Sandra Dorne, Sam Kydd
Kenneth More, George Cole and Robertson Hare get washed up on a desert island with Joan Collins. Which one cops off with the girl? Check the billing. There are no surprises in this mild comedy - in fact the only unpredictable thing in the film is More's Irish accent.
Script adapt.: Noel Langley. (o.a. Norman Lindsay)
Director: Noel Langley
Players: Hermione Gingold, Walter Fitzgerald, Hattie Jacques
Alec Guinness takes the title role in one of the better of the Graham Greene adaptations.
Script adapt.: (o.a.) Graham Greene
Director: Carol Reed
Players: Maureen O'Hara, Burl Ives, Ernie Kovacs, Ralph Richardson, Noel Coward, Jo Morrow, Paul Rogers, Gregoire Aslan, Duncan Macrea, Maurice Denham, Raymond Huntley, Jose Prieto, Timothy Bateman, Hugh Manning, Karel Stepanek, Ferdy Maine, Maxine Audley, Rachel Roberts
The glamour of fifties flying is the chief interest in this airport drama. An assortment of passengers wait for the fog to clear so they can get on with their lives. The VIP's did it better in the sixties and with a better cast.
Script adapt.: Michael Relph, John Eldridge, Rex Rienits. (o.a. John Fores)
Director: Basil Dearden
Players: Anthony Steele, Eunice Gayson, Robert Beatty, David Knight, James Robertson Justice, Marie Lohr, Gordon Harker, Isabel Deans, Margo Lorenz, Abraham Sofar, Bernard Lee, Megs Jenkins, Sidney James, Esma Cannon, Cyril Luckham, Katie Johnson, William Franklyn
A couple of comics get swindled and turn to bookmaking. When another swindle leaves them with nothing but a greyhound pup, their only hope is to become dog trainers and try for success at the races.
Even by Leslie Fuller's usual standards, the plot's simple minded and sentimental. There are some smiles to be had though, and it all passes by pleasantly.
Script: Syd Courtney, Lola Harvey
Director: Norman Lee
Players: Leslie Fuller, Hal Gordon, Mary Glynne, Jane Carr, Wallace Geoffrey, Gladdy Sewell, Jimmy Godden, Pat Aherne, John Schofield
A society triple wedding is put at risk when a compromising letter by one of the grooms is used to threaten a breach of promise action.
Enjoyably silly musical with a star part for Stanley Lupino.
Script adapt.: Elizabeth Meehan, Hugh Brooke. (o.a. Stanley Lupino)
Director: Graham Cutts
Players: Claire Luce, Sally Gray, Gina Malo, Laddie Cliff, Judy Kelly, John Wood, Max Baer, Syd Walker, Bertha Belmore, Richard Murdoch, Archibald Batty
Chips Rafferty is the drover trying to move his cattle across the outback to avoid the threat of Japanese invasion. This is probably the best "Western" ever set outside the Old West and rarely lets up for a moment.
Script: Harry Watt
Director: Harry Watt
Players: Daphne Campbell, John Nugent Hayward, Jean Blue, John Fernside
A champion sheepdog is suspected of being a sheep killer.
Compared to the later version, this film concentrates on beautiful scenery and the brutalities of rural life.
Script adapt.: Hugh Maclean (o.a. Alfred Olivant)
Director: Henry Edwards
Players: J Fisher White, Ralph Forbes, James Carew, Yvonne Thomas, Frank Stanmore, Grace Lane, Robert English
This is a lousy film with a shamelessly manipulative performance by its star Will Fyffe but somehow it works. The dog in the title is owned by John Loder while Mr Fyffe owns Black Wull. The men (and dogs) are deadly rivals, particularly when Loder comes sniffing around Fyffe's daughter Margaret Lockwood. There is a climactic sheepdog trial and there's not a dry eye in the house when one of the dogs is revealed to be a sheep worrier and has to be destroyed.
Script adapt.: Michael Hogan, J.B. Williams. (o.a. Alfred Olivant)
Director: Robert Stevenson
Players: Moore Marriott, Graham Moffat, Wilfrid Walter, H.F Maltby, Alf Goddard, Wally Patch
