Originally made in 1945 as part of the acclaimed Frank Capra series 'Why we Fight', The Battle Of Russia examines the various invasions suffered the Russians over the centuries, culminating in the 1941 invasion by 2 million Germans. Here the German blitzkrieg tactics finally met their match.
Daniel Craig returns one last time as James Bond, starring alongside Oscar winner Rami Malek in 'No Time To Die'. Bond has left active service and is enjoying a tranquil life in Jamaica. His peace is short-lived when his old friend Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright) from the CIA turns up asking for help. The mission to rescue a kidnapped scientist turns out to be far more treacherous than expected, leading Bond onto the trail of a mysterious villain armed with dangerous new technology.
Leslie Phillips, Bob Monkhouse, Patricia Hayes, Harry H. Corbett, David Jason, Jimmy Edwards and Richard O'Sullivan are just a few of the stars featuring in this collection of comedy plays penned by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson - the legendary writing team whose timeless credits include both 'Hancock's Half Hour' and 'Steptoe and Son'. Following the same format that had proved so effective with their earlier run of plays for 'Comedy Playhouse', this series consists of six shows:
1. The Suit
A married man falls victim to a rather embarrassing burglary.
2. Friends in High Places
A 55-year-old wishes to be young again and his wish is granted!
3. Never Talk to Strangers
Two lonely people have a chance to find happiness together.
4. Don't Dilly Dally on the Way
After 23 years in the same bungalow, a couple prepares to move house.
5. Pity Poor Edie...Married to Him
What happens to a marriage when the breadwinner finds she is expecting?
6. An Extra Bunch of Daffodils
A man who has buried five heavily insured wives begins a search for his sixth...
Smarmy, psychotic fortune hunter Edward "Teddy" Bare (Dirk Bogarde) has a penchant for the older woman... and for murder! Having plied his elderly wife (Mona Washbourne) with alcohol, the modern day Bluebeard leaves her to die from gas poisoning by the fireplace of their stately home. Having done the nasty however, his wife's fortune soon turns out to be far smaller than Edward realised, and what there is has been entailed away to a distant sister. He sets his greedy sights on the heavily insured barkeeper Freda (Margaret Lockwood). Edward soon grows restless with his crass new wife, who refuses to give him a penny, and instead targets a third wealthy matron (Kay Walsh). She, however, is no fool and has plenty of her own secrets. Secrets that could expose Teddy. Has he finally met his match?
Tom, (Timothy Spall) an elderly widower, uses his trusty free bus pass to take a series of local buses on a deeply nostalgic trip across the length of the U.K., from John O' Groats to Lands End. His mission is to fulfil a promise he made to his late wife, to take her back to the place where they first met and lived happily together. Unbeknownst to Tom, his journey, and his unlikely antics on it, begin to capture the imagination of the local people that he comes across and, ultimately, Tom and his trip become a nationwide news story.
Award-winning historian and broadcaster Bettany Hughes presents a new eight-part landmark history of ancient Rome. Across the series Hughes explores eight key days that she believes define the Roman Empire and help us to understand its remarkable success. In each episode Hughes travels across the Roman world, delving into the psyche and uncovering brand new archaeological evidence, while lavish drama brings the incredible story of Rome to life. The eight days include Rome's early defeat of her great rival Carthage under Hannibal, at the battle of Zama; a crucial moment and one of the most important battles in ancient history when Rome, an influential city-state becomes an unstoppable Empire. We also explore the day when Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon River and set in chain a series of events which would ultimately culminate in the end of Rome's republic. The final episode looks at the day Constantine, close to death, was finally baptised as a Christian. It was here he made a final declaration of the spiritual allegiance that had a profound importance not just for the Empire, but for the future of the world.
Career first. Everything else second. According to vaudevillian Archie Rice (Laurence Olivier), the show must go on - even if it means stringing along his fellow performers, exploiting the hopes and money of a starlet and neglecting his own family. This is Archie's world, but not everyone wants to live in it. His only daughter (Joan Plowright) will do everything she can to breakthrough and bring him around; if only she can make him listen...
A highly influential but critically neglected movement in British cinema history, "Free Cinema" not only re-invented British documentary in the 1950s but also served as a precursor for the better known British New Wave of social-realist feature films in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Born in February 1956, when a group, led by critic and filmmaker Lindsay Anderson, screened their short films at the National Film Theatre, Free Cinema proved so popular that five more programmes followed until 1959, featuring films by young British and foreign filmmakers. The BFI has brought together, for the first time, the eleven films of the three British programmes in this 3-disc boxset. This definitive collection includes a number of fascinating shorts made on a shoestring budget and a 16mm Bolex camera by first-time directors such as Karel Reisz and Tony Richardson (Momma Don't Allow), Claude Goretta and Alain Tanner (Nice Time), Michael Grigsby (Enginemen) and Robert Vas (Refuge England), as weN as the more ambitious, 35mm featurettes Together (dir. Lorenza Mazzetti), Every Day Except Christmas (dir. Lindsay Anderson) and We Are the Lambeth Boys (dir. Karel Reisz). The third disc features an exclusive 43-minute documentary with interviews, film extracts and previously unseen stills, as well as a specially curated collection of rarely seen films made in the spirit of the Free Cinema movement.
An essential Second World War documentary from the Emmy Award winning team behind the PBS Series 'Battlefield' and Discovery Channel's 'Weapons of War'. 'The Battle of Stalingrad' was a major and decisive battle of World War II in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad. The battle took place between August, 1942 and February, 1943 and was marked by constant close-quarters combat and lack of regard for military and civilian casualties. It is among the bloodiest battles in the history of warfare, with estimates of combined casualties amounting to nearly two million. The heavy losses inflicted on Hitler's Wehrmacht made it a significant turning point in the war. After the Battle of Stalingrad, German forces never recovered their earlier strength, and attained no further strategic victories in the East. The documentary features rare Soviet and German archive film footage, as well as unique primary sources to create a comprehensive account of the Battle of Stalingrad.
Prior to the advent of television, newsreels were an essential part of the movie going experience. Shown at theatres prior to the feature, these short news films brought current events of the world visually to movie-watchers. As the most publicized woman of her generation, everything Marilyn Monroe did made headlines, and in the process she graced numerous newsreels. This collection brings together for the first time many of those newsreels as well as the original trailers of all her greatest films. Trailers teased the audience with highlights of forthcoming attractions and were usually edited to capture the viewer's attention, often utilizing superimposed descriptive text that seemed to explode from the screen. With films like Niagara, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes or Don't Bother to Knock, one needn't go to far to get people's attention; simply showing Marilyn Monroe walk, talk, smile, or slip into something more comfortable was enough. In essence, these newsreels and trailers enable viewers of today to witness exactly the same thing that audiences did in the postwar era. As if that wasn't enough, this DVD set also includes 24 of Marilyn's finest vocal numbers as well as a gallery of movie posters and stills. All in all, it's an incredibly satisfying collector's piece that showcases Miss Monroe's enduring power as a symbol of the eternal feminine.
So many historic events made the 1950s a decade to remember. Here, in over 10 hours of programming, you can remember history in motion. The beginning of the decade sees Dior instated as king of the catwalks, shocking the world with his new length skirt, Prince Rainier acceding the throne of Monaco and the de Havilland comet setting the standard for jet airliners. Join Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart on holiday in Venice and Princess Margaret celebrating her 21st birthday. Experience the mourning of 2 nations: Argentina for their first lady Eva Peron and Britain for King George VI. Experience the splendour and ceremony of Queen Elizabeths coronation and the triumph of England winning back The Ashes after 20 years. Enjoy the 100th anniversary of the Varsity Boat Race, Donald Campbell smashing the world water speed record and then the landspeed record in 'Bluebird'. Towards the end of the decade, relive the excitement of John Wayne winning an Oscar, the height of Maria Callas' fame and the millionth citizen arriving in Australia. Enjoy these and many more prominent events of the 50s. History in motion - commemorative and informative - the perfect gift for yourself or for someone close to you.
In this true-life cold war spy thriller, unossuming British businessman Greville Wynne (Benedict Cumberbatch) becomes entangled in one of the greatest international conflicts in history. Recruited by MI6 and a CIA operative (Rachel Brosnahan), Wynne forms a covert partnership with Soviet officer Oleg Penkovsky (Merab Ninidze), and both men risk everything in a danger-fraught race against time to provide the intelligence needed to prevent nuclear confrontation and end the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Diane Keaton stars as Carol Lipton, a bored Manhattan housewife who becomes convinced that her next-door neighbour has committed a murder. When her sceptical husband Larry (Woody Allen) rejects the idea, Carol turns to a flirtatious friend (Alan Alda) to help her search for clues. And as their enthusiasm for the case grows, so does their interest in each other. Spurred on by jealousy - and by a seductive writer (Anjelica Huston) who's also excited by the mystery - Larry reluctantly joins the chase, only to learn that much more than his marriage is at stake. A comic romp bursting with wry one-liners and inspired sight gags.
An illuminating and spectacular six-part odyssey tracing the development of Western civilisation - from the first cities of Mesopotamia to the fall of the Roman Empire. Academic and archaeologist Richard Miles travels through the Middle East, Egypt, Pakistan and the Mediterranean to discover how the mainstays of our society - community, democracy, commerce and technology - were forged and fought over in a series of classical cultures. Ancient Worlds tells the amazing stories of disappeared, ruined and modern cities - from Ancient Iraq to Augustan Rome, and from Phoenicia and the city states of Greece to today's Damascus - and reveals the compromise, ruthlessness, sacrifice and toil that made each city work. In an epic sweep of history against a panorama of stunning locations, Richard Miles, with the help of local experts and archaeologists, brings these legendary civilisations back to life to show how the successes and failures of the ancients shaped the world that we have inherited.
The sensational 'discovery' of Hitler's diaries and subsequent realisation that they were forged caused a world-wide scandal in 1983. Alastair Reid's tongue-in-cheek five-part dramatisation, based on Robert Harris's best-selling novel, exposes the machinations that led to Stern magazine's announcement of the scoop of the century, the ensuing bidding war for serialisation rights, acrimony among the eminent historians who were taken in and, finally, the diaries' exposure as an elaborate hoax.
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