Volume one of "Erotic Tales". Conceived by one of Germany's most successful producers, Regina Ziegler, this is a series of short films by prolific international directors who were given carte blanche to create films that captured their vision of the erotic in their cultures.
"Lost Empires" is a powerful and evocative recreation of the dying days of the music hall circuit. Adrift in the world, young Richard Herncastle (Colin Firth) is taken on by his formidable Uncle Nick (John Castle), a top-of-the-bill magician working under the 'exotic' name of Ganga Dun. Richard finds himself immersed in the dusty glamour of a life onstage introducing him to comedians, dancers, musicians, jugglers, singers...and women, beautiful, talented, tempting women. Featuring a superb cast, including Laurence Olivier, gripping in one of his last performances as a comic past his prime, and Pamela Stephenson as a beautiful Siren beckoning Richard to the rocks, 'Lost Empires' captures the fading magic and constant upheaval of a life on the road with its glamorous theatres and dour boarding houses; the smell of more than just greasepaint, the roar of more than just the crowd.
Pretty Anne Fielding (Dulcie Gray) has her pick of men. There's her boyfriend, the sophisticated Victor (Eric Portman), and now there's Jack... He's the humble bus conductor who comes to her rescue after the bus stalls and delays her journey by an hour. She was on her way to meet Victor at the Hampstead Heath fairground and Jack gallantly escorts her there. Sparks fly between the pair as they share ice cream and enjoy the fair while keeping an eye out for Victor. When they finally reunite, Anne and Victor head for home at the same time a young woman is found dead on the Heath. She appears to be the latest victim of The Strangler', a notorious serial killer who has already struck five times before. With Jack seen storming away from the scene and Victor's handkerchief found near the body, the police seize both men to appear in the lineup of potential suspects. A crazed game of cat and mouse ensues and Anne soon finds herself in serious danger. The police are up against time in this race to draw the threads together - but in the end, which neck will they close around? Will the police get their killer before he gets Anne?
Pioneering, immensely influential and often challenging, 'Armchair Theatre' was ITV's flagship drama anthology series. Bringing high-quality drama to the viewing public, the series easily demonstrated the network's potential to rival the BBC's drama output, with diverse and powerful plays showcasing some of Britain's most gifted writers. This release comprises four plays featuring performances by some of the era's most celebrated and accomplished actors - including Barry Foster, Joseph Tomelty, Patrick Wymark, Athene Seyler, Clive Morton, Zena Walker, Earl Cameron, Donald Houston, Katharine Blake and Lynn Redgrave.
Featured Plays:
- Worm in the Bud (1959)
- The Invasion (1963)
- The Chocolate Tree (1963)
- What's Wrong With Humpty Dumpty? (1967)
Armchair Theatre Archive: Vol.1 (1969)Nothing To Pay (1962) / The Cherry on the Top (1964) / Light the Blue Touch Paper (1966) / Edward the Confessor (1969)
Pioneering, immensely influential and often challenging, Armchair Theatre was ITV's flagship drama anthology series. Bringing high-quality drama to the viewing public, the series easily demonstrated the network's potential to rival the BBC's drama output, with diverse and powerful plays showcasing some of Britain's most gifted writers. This release comprises four plays featuring performances by some of the era's most celebrated and accomplished actors including Clifford Evans, Kenneth Griffith, Robert Lang, Pauline Yates, Anna Massey, Ronald Hines, Beryl Reid, Ian Holm and Alfred Burke.
Featured Plays:
- Nothing to Pay (1962)
- The Cherry on the Top (1964)
- Light the Blue Touch Paper (1966)
- Edward the Confessor (1969)
This is the incredibly powerful story of the Stalin years. It is based on rarely seen archival footage, contemporary diaries and documents and personal memoirs, as well as interviews with relatives and those people who survived the Gulag labour camps and World War II. It follows events from Stalin's rise to power, his association with Hitler and the Soviet involvement in the Second World War right through to his death. With an introduction by Nobel Peace Prize winner, diplomat and statesman Dr. Henry Kissinger, this is the incredibly powerful story of the Stalin years. It is based on rarely seen archival footage, contemporary diaries and documents and personal memoirs as well as interviews with relatives and those people who survived the Gulag labour camps and World War II.
Part 1
Part One begins with the death of Lenin and the power struggle that followed. Stalin's rise to power saw him launch an assault on the peasantry and his political rivals, as well as a disastrous purge of the Red Army. An alliance with Nazi Germany was soon to follow, yet would be quickly rendered meaningless as the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, leading to chaos and confusion as the Red Army fell back. Stalin, paralysed by the shock, retreated to his dacha. Minsk, Kiev and Smolensk fell. Stalin returned from hiding and signed the infamous Order 270, branding captured Soviet officers as traitors and committing their wives to forced labour. All too soon, the Wehrmacht would arrive at the gates of Moscow.
Part 2
Part Two begins with the Germans at the gates of Moscow, as the winter closed in and starvation claimed thousands of lives in the besieged city of Leningrad. During the war in the occupied Soviet Union, many oppressed Soviet citizens welcomed Hitler, but their enthusiasm was shortlived as they discovered his plans. The Partisan resistance began without Stalin's support, but he would soon grow to accept the Partisans, providing them with supplies. As the Wehrmacht moved south toward the oil fields of the Caucasus, Stalin specifically prohibited any retreat on the battlefield on pain of death. The battle for Stalingrad would test that resolve.
Part 3
Part Three opens with 'the spring stalemate'. Soviet war production, now moved out of the reach of German bombers, had begun to increase dramatically. The Germans prepared to meet the Red Army on the plains of Kursk, in the greatest tank battle in the history of warfare. After a 900-day siege, the Soviets finally liberated Leningrad. The Red Army pushed westward and began to retake the territories that had been occupied by the Germans for so long. Once again, Stalin had plans for the people who suffered under the occupation.
Part 4
Part Four begins with Germany on the brink of defeat. As the Red Army approached Berlin, Hitler mobilised both young and old to defend the doomed city. Following the fall of Berlin and the death of his old enemy, Stalin turned once again to the control of his own people. As old age crept up on him, Stalin's obsessive paranoia continued and he further persecuted his people. With the threat of the atomic bomb blocking his plans for territorial expansion, the world entered the new era of the Cold War.
Lee Miller, an American photographer, who served as model and muse to Man Ray died in 1977 after an extraordinary life. From her first steps as a nude model photographed by her father, and then by Man Ray, to the series of photographs that she took of Montparnasse in the thirties and the ones as a war correspondent, she said never to have lost a minute of her life. Sylvain Roumette brings this exceptional and true adventures in photography back to life. Two voices: her son and the photographer David Scherman guide us through the life and career of Lee Miller, a major artist became a twentieth century icon.
This hard-hitting anthology series continued the single-play format that had proved so successful with ITV's legendary 'Armchair Theatre', presenting six contemporary plays by writers at relatively early stages in their careers. The plays are both compelling and provocative: Stephen Poliakoff's 'Hitting Town' is an intense portrayal of siblings who find refuge from their bleak lives in one incestuous night; Roger McGough's 'The Lifeswappers' is a darkly comic take on the theme of exchanged identities; Howard Brenton's 'The Paradise Run' centres on an inexperienced soldier in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.
In a vividly realised post-apocalyptic London, Mrs Ethel Shroake is crowned Queen and Lord Fortnum awaits his imminent transformation into a bedsitting room. Meanwhile, seventeen-months pregnant Penelope and her parents, having eaten all the chocolate bars on the Circle Line, leave the safety of their underground carriage to find her a husband and finally reclaim their baggage.
This unique collection of 8 short, erotic, silent black and white films was shot in Hollywood by Cine Art Productions in the 1920s using studio stages after hours and starring wannabee starlets. The films are fun and innocent by modern day standards - girls disporting themselves without clothes in a selection of situations and stories, on the beach, hiding in caves, dressing up in revue... The films were found next to a hand grenade in an air raid shelter in West Hampstead, the reels of film stored in canisters hidden both from the bombs and prying eyes.
Ken Russell's sensuous film version of DH Lawrence's The Rainbow follows his Academy Award Winning adaptation of Women In Love and stars Sammi Davis, Paul McGann, Amanda Donohoe and Glenda Jackson. Set in the Midlands of Victorian England, The Rainbow tells the story of a rebellious young woman who after defying her parents and society's morality, engages in an unbridled and passionate affair first with her beautiful school teacher, Then with a fascinating young soldier , before setting out on her own to capture the fuller sensuality of life itself.
Ursula Brangwen (Imogen Stubbs) is the beautiful, naive daughter of a wealthy country squire, one of five children living in the Nottinghamshire mining heartland at the turn of the century. From wide-eyed sixteen-year-old to fully grown woman, the drama follows Ursula through the trials and tribulations of her burgeoning personal relationships in her quest to find fulfilment for her developing passionate and sensual nature. This highly acclaimed three part mini-series was Imogen Stubbs' breakthrough role while the supporting cast includes Kate Buffery as Ursula's swimming instructor Winifred Inger and Tom Bell as Old Tom Brangwen. Martin Wenner plays soldier Anton Skrebensky with Jon Finch as Uncle Tom. Atmospheric, sensuous and haunting, this production is widely considered one of the finest -adaptations of D.H. Lawrence's controversial and ground breaking novel, one of the greatest works in all English literature.
At the height of the First World War, two young British soldiers, Schofield (George MacKay) and Blake (Dean-Charles Chapman) are given a seemingly impossible mission. In a race against time, they must cross enemy territory and deliver a message that will stop a deadly attack on hundreds of soldiers - Blake's own brother among them.
Working in secret for the Air Ministry at his remote country house laboratory, John Barrington (Leslie Banks) is key to the ongoing war effort against the Nazis. Barrington's household, however, has been infiltrated by enemy agents who plan to take him back to Berlin as prisoner.
After the war, Jim Harding (Douglass Montgomery) is desperate to put his knowledge of chemistry to good use but his wife's greed forces him to sell potions for baldness and stomach disorders in a fairground booth on Blackpool's Golden Mile. His marriage hits rock bottom when his wife Diana (Patricia Burke) dates a theatrical impresario behind his back and Jim falls in love with the beautiful Jane Thompson (Hazel Court), who runs the candyfloss stall opposite. But Jim's newfound happiness is cut short when his wife finds out about their affair and refuses to give him a divorce. As their marriage disintegrates into constant bickering, Jim takes a walk along Blackpool's crowded shore and decides to murder his wife...
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