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jlnight wrote: Sun Jun 01, 2025 3:00 pm Cracked Actor is showing on Sun 8th Jun on BBC2 as part of a night dedicated to the late Alan Yentob. During his tenure as BBC2 controller the channel ushered in Moviedrome. There is a season in July and August down at the BFI featuring some films from those series!

This week's episode of Have I Got News for You had a dedication to Yentob at the end. He commissioned the show back in 1990.

GaryC wrote: Sun Jun 01, 2025 6:19 pm

jlnight wrote: Sun Jun 01, 2025 3:00 pm Cracked Actor is showing on Sun 8th Jun on BBC2 as part of a night dedicated to the late Alan Yentob. During his tenure as BBC2 controller the channel ushered in Moviedrome. There is a season in July and August down at the BFI featuring some films from those series!

This week's episode of Have I Got News for You had a dedication to Yentob at the end. He commissioned the show back in 1990.

Cracked Actor is of course the profile of David Bowie that famously Nicolas Roeg saw and convinced him that Bowie would be perfect for the part in The Man Who Fell To Earth.

Yentob is both a famous and notorious figure of recent years. He was famous for running the BBC's artistic programming (or as famous as David Attenborough for doing the same) and created many high profile arts programmes such as his "Imagine.." strand - a lot involving his celebrity acquaintances. Perhaps his most famous is his profile of Mel Brooks, who ironically (as with Judi Dench et al in Roger Michell's "Nothing Like A Dame" documentary) has now outlived his decades younger biographer.

Unfortunately Yentob became a controversial figure in recent years when after serving on the board of the Kids Company charity, he apparently tried to leverage his BBC position to try to prevent the BBC's Newsnight programme from reporting on the controversies associated with that charity in 2015. That led to Yentob pulling back from his BBC commitments, though he continued to present his "Imagine..." programme in occasional primetime BBC1 slots, and still received an CBE from King Charles last year. So obviously they didn't feel too strongly about the controversy to stall their associations.

Eclectic stuff next week. On Saturday 7th Channel 4 is showing the latest in the "Liam Neeson is on the hunt for the bad guys" subgenre with Memory at 9:30 p.m., which is interesting for its Memento-esque seeming premise of Neeson's character suffering from dementia, the unreliable memory aspects perhaps being underlined by the presence of Guy Pearce in the cast. Monica Bellucci is also in there and the film is directed by Martin Campbell (of GoldenEye, the 2006 Casino Royale and the two Zorro films), so that makes it at least worth a glance.

The real curio of the week is later in the evening as Film4 shows the Spanish 'bullied teen utilising a local serial killer for revenge purposes' film Piggy at Midnight.

BBC4's Storyville documentary of the week is the Israeli film Wedding Night at 10 p.m. on Tuesday 10th. And while it has not been noted as a premiere in the RadioTimes, this is the first time I noticed that Paul Schrader's Master Gardener is showing on Freeview, on the "Great Movies" channel at 9 p.m., also on Tuesday 10th.
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Repeat-wise, the 1953 Marlon Brando version of Julius Caesar is on BBC2 at 2 p.m. on Sunday 8th. One of the best of the Ian McEwan adaptations (up there with Atonement), The Children Act, is on BBC2 at 11 p.m. on Monday 9th.

And BBC4's 'archive television' strand is showing the six episode 1983 version of Mansfield Park (with Anna Massey!) in two three episode chunks from 10 p.m. on Wednesday 11th and Thursday 12th.

(it is also a weirdly Kristin Scott-Thomas heavy weekend with screenings of The Woman In The Fifth (on Film4) in the early hours of Sunday 8th; and later that day a repeat of Four Weddings and a Funeral on BBC1 at 10:30 p.m. on Sunday 8th)

King Rat, Sat 14th Jun, Talking Pictures. (been on Freeview)
The Silent Invasion (1962), Sat 14th Jun, Talking Pictures.
California Suite, Sat 14th Jun, Talking Pictures. Or...
Kidnapped (2023), Sat 14th Jun, BBC4.

Assignment K, Sun 15th Jun, Talking Pictures.
28 Days Later, Sun 15th Jun, BBC1.

An Honourable Murder (1960), Mon 16th Jun, Talking Pictures.

Doomwatch: Hair Trigger + The Stone Tape (BBC TVM), Fri 20th Jun, Talking Pictures. (Cellar Club)
Sheroes (2023), late Fri 20th Jun, Channel 4.



Day of Anger (1967) is a no-show.

Lots of stuff next week. There is a clash of the titans on the evening of Saturday 13th as Godzilla vs. Kong turns up at 7:30 p.m. on ITV1; which overruns into Channel 4's premiere of M3GAN at 9:30 p.m.; as well as into BBC4's premiere of Marco Bellocchio's 2023 film Kidnapped at 9 p.m. (EDIT: And in amongst the deluge of films on Saturday evening, there was also a last minute schedule change where BBC4 showed a repeat of the Brian Wilson biopic Love & Mercy straight after Kidnapped)

Storyville's documentary of the week is The Contestant at 10 p.m. on Tuesday 17th.

The first premiere of a film from 2025 in 2025 is Channel 5's TV movie Deadly Girls Trip at 2:15 p.m. on Wednesday 18th. I'll let M3GAN describe that one. Later on in the evening of the same day on Film4 at 9 p.m. is the terminal illness drama Our Friend, from the director who did that 2013 killer whale documentary Blackfish.

BBC4 is showing the 6 part Canal+ French documentary series about Formula 1 racing driver Alain Prost with episodes 1 & 2 from 8 p.m. on Thursday 19th. Also on Thursday, tucked away on the "Legend" digital channel is the premiere of 2011's Inside Out, at 9 p.m.

And as jlnight has noted Channel 4 is showing Sheroes at 12:55 a.m. in the early hours of Saturday 21st.
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Repeat-wise, Decision to Leave is on BBC2 at 12:30 a.m. in the early hours of Sunday 15th. BBC4 is showing 1992 TV movie The Lost Language of Cranes again at 10:15 p.m. on Sunday 15th, but this time preceded with a new 15 minute introduction by Brian Cox from 10 p.m.

BBC4's 'archive television' offering of the week is continuing the Jane Austen theme with the four part 2009 adaptation of Emma with episodes 1 & 2 showing at 10:15 p.m. on Wednesday 18th (with a new 15 minute introduction from Romola Garai at 10 p.m.), and episodes 3 & 4 showing from 11:55 p.m. on Thursday 19th.

And on the exact date of the 50th anniversary of its release, ITV4 is showing Jaws at 9 p.m. on Friday 20th.

Captain Kidd (1945), Sat 21st Jun, Talking Pictures.
The Key (1958), Sat 21st Jun, Talking Pictures. Or...
Saint Omer, Sat 21st Jun, BBC4. Or...
Alien Nation (1988), Sat 21st Jun, Legend. (last on TPTV)
The Magic Sword (1962), Sat 21st Jun, Talking Pictures. (last on Rewind)

In a Lonely Place, Sun 22nd Jun, Talking Pictures.
East of Sudan, Sun 22nd Jun, Talking Pictures. (been on Freeview) Or...
Day of Anger, Sun 22nd Jun, 5Action.
Saltburn, Sun 22nd Jun, BBC1.

The Battleaxe (1962), Tue 24th Jun, Talking Pictures.
Boston Strangler (2023), Tue 24th Jun, Film4.

Moby Dick (1956), Wed 25th Jun, Legend. (last on London Live)

Part-Time Wife, Thu 26th Jun, Talking Pictures.
Posse (1975), Thu 26th Jun, Legend.



Cruel Passion another no-show, replaced with Hussy.

Lots of things next week. Saint Omer is on BBC4 at 9 p.m. on Saturday 21st. Saltburn turns up on BBC1 at 10:30 p.m. on Sunday 22nd (which apparently propelled Murder on the Dancefloor and Perfect (Exceeder) back into the public eye a couple of years back)

Unfortunately the premiere of the 2023 version of The Boston Strangler on Film4 at 9 p.m. on Tuesday 24th (I wonder if it will have as many multi-screen sequences as thhe 1968 film! Probably not!), clashes against BBC4's Storyville documentary of the week, The Wolves Always Come At Night, at 10 p.m.
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Repeat-wise, it is mainly BBC4's continuing Jane Austen season, with a screening of the 1987 version of Northanger Abbey at 10:15 p.m. on Wednesday 25th (which from my searches appears to keep being described as a adaptation playing up the Gothic aspects, so that sounds interesting!), preceded at 10 p.m. by a new 15 minute interview with actress Katherine Schlesinger. That screening is bookened by a 2011 piece "The Real Jane Austen" at 9 p.m. and followed at 11:45 p.m. by a 1995 Omnibus documentary "Presumption: The Life of Jane Austen".

And on Thursday 26th BBC4 shows the 1995 Roger Michell directed adaptation of Persuasion at 10:15 p.m., preceded at 10 p.m. by a new 15 minute introduction by actresses Amanda Root and Sophie Thompson.

In the last couple of days there have been some big changes in the 'terrestrial digital freeview' channels. No more "That's..." channels other than "That's 3/Memories" still, but there are a couple of new developments. The first is more of a re-branding than a change but the "ITVBe" channel, which was normally full of female-centric programmes - mostly the "Real Housewives..."-style series, but I also caught a screening of Pretty Woman on there a couple of weeks ago, which reminded me of how good that film is, and that I should schedule an "Algo-rhythms" month devoted to its soundtrack at some point - has been re-branded into the "ITV Quiz" channel, which is showing repeats of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, Tipping Point and its ilk. So there is not too much of interest film-wise on there at the moment.

Slightly more interesting is that the "5Select" channel has arrived on terrestrial freeview now. That similarly is the least interesting of the Channel 5 digital spin off channels (with 5USA showing all the NCSIS-style shows; and 5Star doing a weekly film), but at least it has a nightly double bill of Prisoner Cell Block H, so that's something!

The Channel 4 catch-up channel 4Seven has now arrived, and that repeats premiere film screenings from the weekend on Channel 4 during the mid-week, so that should be handy for the times when those films clash with the other channels.

A strange channel called "U&Eden" has appeared, which is currently showing old BBC shows such as re-runs of Top of the Pops (plus ITV's cop series The Bill), but tomorrow has a 12 hour block of a Doctor Who story called "The Mutants" from 12:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m.(!)

The most exciting of all the new arrivals is that the "Legend Xtra" channel has arrived on terrestrial freeview. This is a spin-off of the "Legend" channel that weirdly remains absent, but at least that does mean that I can start recommending films shown on that channel now. Nothing too spectacular turns up next week, though there is the goofy looking Malibu Shark Attack at 5 p.m. on Wednesday 25th. The Loft is showing at 10:50 p.m. on Monday 23rd. And I am quite interested in the double bill of Officer Down at 9 p.m. and the Arnold Schwarzenegger depressing-looking drama film Aftermath at 11 p.m. on Friday 27th.

Highway to Battle, Sat 28th Jun, Talking Pictures.
They Call Me Trinity, Sat 28th Jun, 5Action.
Body Double, Sat 28th Jun, Talking Pictures.
The Deer Hunter, Sat 28th Jun, Legend. (been on other channels)

Past Lives, Sun 29th Jun, BBC2. Or...
Strip Tease Murder, Sun 29th Jun, Talking Pictures.

The Court Martial of Major Keller, Mon 30th Jun, Talking Pictures.

Pickup Alley (Interpol), Tue 1st July, Talking Pictures. Or...
A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things, Tue 1st July, Sky Arts.

The Integrity Of Joseph Chambers, Thu 3rd July, Film4.

Bachelor Knight (The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer), Fri 4th July, BBC2.


Here is another Alex Cox intro to Trinity from ITV4 in 2005:

Spoiler

They Call Me Trinity was a seachange for the Spaghetti Western. The Spaghetti Western genre really began in 1964 with the release of Sergio Leone's groundbreaking A Fistful of Dollars. A Fistful of Dollars was of course based on Kurosawa's samurai film Yojimbo and the two films were so similar that Kurosawa's producers sued Leone's producers for a share of the profits. The model was enormously popular and successful. Leone's friend, Sergio Corbucci, directed his own version of Yojimbo in 1965 and many other Italian directors did likewise while Leone, always seeking to out-do himself, directed a much better western about bankrobbers and revenge-seeking bounty hunters, For A Few Dollars More.

In 1966 the genre erupted with the international release of several quite magnificent films, among them Corbucci's Django, Damiani's A Bullet for the General, Sergio Sollima's The Big Gundown and the third part of Leone's trilogy, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. So by 1970, the genre only six years old, was clearly breaking at its seams, searching for new directions to go in. So the pressure was on for writers and directors to come up with something new using existing assets.

In a lot of ways the genre was already lurching towards comedy. Enzo Barboni had been the cameraman of Corbucci's Django, Eugenio Martin's The Ugly Ones and several other very good Italian westerns but what he really wanted to do was to direct. And so in 1970 he borrowed a team which had been assembled by another director (Giuseppe Colizzi), Terence Hill and Bud Spencer.

Spencer is a talented comic of the slow-burn variety. Hill's comedic talents are less obvious. Barboni the director took the essential Laurel and Hardy personae of Hill and Spencer and made them the heroes of a Spaghetti Western environment, characterised by its shabiness and its surprising affability. Gone was the atmosphere of absolute and vicious violence which had characterised Django and The Big Silence. Gone was the possibility that the hero might lose or be blinded or suffer a terrible defeat, as he had in the Dollars films, before staggering back to victory.

Trinity, Terence Hill's character, is, as the Monthly Film Bulletin put it, "laconic to the point of imbecility, hopelessly scruffy and downs villains behind his back like nine-pins, without even bothering to turn around". Hiding behind the pseudonym of E.B. Clutcher, Barboni doesn't stretch himself but remains happy with a visually ordinary, good-humoured, non-violent parody of a Sergio Sollima film.

Rather quiet next week. jlnight has noted the big films of the week with Past Lives on BBC2 at 10 p.m. on Sunday 29th and The Integrity of Joseph Chambers on Film4 at 11:20 p.m. (from the director of The Killing of Two Lovers)

BBC4's Storyville documentary of the week is The Srebrenica Tape at 10 p.m. on Tuesday 1st; and BBC4's 'archive television' screening is the Emily Watson starring 7/7 drama A Song For Jenny at 10:45 p.m. on Wednesday 2nd, preceded with a new 15 minute introduction at 10:30 p.m. with the author and screenwriter.
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Not too much in terms of repeats, though Michael Mann's Public Enemies appears on Film4 at 9 p.m. on Wednesday 2nd.

The Anderson Tapes, Sat 5th July, Talking Pictures. Or...
Wild Bill (1995), Sat 5th July, Great Action.

The Stick Up (1977), Sun 6th July, Together TV.
Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice, Sun 6th July, Talking Pictures. (last on Sony Movies)

St Benny the Dip, Mon 7th July, Talking Pictures.

Carnival of Souls, Tue 8th July, Rewind TV. (on before, ex-Moviedrome)

The Trouble with Mr Doodle, Wed 9th July, Channel 4.

Four Hits and a Mister (short), Thu 10th July, Talking Pictures.
The Wicker Man + Don't Look Now, Thu 10th July, BBC4. (Moviedrome double-bill)

Cruel Passion, Fri 11th July, Together TV.

Quiet next week, since it is the week where football, Wimbledon and the Tour de France all take over the majority of the schedules. Channel 5 has another 'too hot for 2:15 p.m.' TV movie premiere with The Ruby Franke Story: Devil Mum (aka Mormon Mom Gone Wrong in its original Lifetime title!) at 11 p.m. on Sunday 6th. It does have another 2:15 p.m. premiere during the week too, of the shriekingly titled My Child Has My Doctor's Face! on Wednesday 9th.

Film4's one premiere of the week is American Refugee at 11:40 p.m. on Tuesday 8th. Which looks a bit Purge or It Comes At Night-lite. And looks about as down to earth as your average Lifetime TV movie!
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The big event of the week though is BBC4 doing a tribute to Moviedrome on Thursday 10th July. The films being shown are nothing too exciting, just the original Wicker Man and Don't Look Now again, but they are going to be shown with their original Moviedrome introductions for the first time since their original broadcast. jlnight brought this up to me a few days ago that there is a BFI Southbank season of Moviedrome films with their original introductions showing throughout July and August, so this must be the BBC's contribution to tie in with that season. The 1988 Alex Cox introduction to The Wicker Man was the very first Moviedrome introduction, showing the director's cut version of the film on television for the first time, and that is followed at the other end of the series by Mark Cousins' 2000 introduction to Don't Look Now, during his 'white void' period (which was the one that was providing the initial suggestion that the BBC were giving up on Moviedrome by having Cousins do all of his links in a studio rather than in evocative locations as had previously characterised the series. The other sign that the BBC were giving up on the series was also that the final series was the one in which they did not show the best available versions of the films they screened - most notably in Cousins talking up a half hour longer 'director's cut' version of Luc Besson's Leon, and then we got the theatrical version, pan-and-scanned to add to the indignity! And Jackie Chan's Rumble in the Bronx was also shown pan-and-scanned and dubbed into English. Although to balance it out even in that final year there were screenings of Clubbed To Death and the surprisingly little shown since Jack Nicholson and Michael Caine team up Blood & Wine to savour).

Amusingly, as Cox says in his introduction, The Wicker Man was cut down on its original theatrical release to act as the second half of a double bill with... Don't Look Now. So in addition to the Moviedrome tribute, the BBC have cheekily recreated the theatrical release of the films here!

A Man Called Otto (2022), Sat 12th July, Channel 4. Or...
Mickey One, Sat 12th July, Talking Pictures.
The Innocents (1961), Sat 12th July, Film4. (last on TPTV)

Father's Little Dividend, Sun 13th July, Talking Pictures.

It Rained Three Times Last Year (??), late Mon 14th July, Talking Pictures.

Babylon (2022), Fri 18th July, Film4. Or...
Remember My Name, late Fri 18th July, Talking Pictures. (on before)



Wild Bill (1995) a no-show.

More articles have appeared in relation to the BFI season and Nick Jones in an interview with Starburst gave this juicy nugget:

The BBC, of course, have wiped everything. So, hilariously, they’re doing a couple of movies on BBC Four around the time of this BFI season, and they contacted me to ask if I could help them with materials for the original intros. I said, well, try YouTube. That’s where I’ve been looking.

Also he only worked on the first two Cousins seasons, which may account for the 'white void' format of the final season.

So, the Beeb will have to rely on VHS recordings for the intros. It was their programme in the first place!

jlnight wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 11:12 am It Rained Three Times Last Year (??), late Mon 14th July, Talking Pictures.

TPTV's online schedule is blank for this. It appears to be a two-part edition of Picture Box from 1981, though going by the TV & Radio Database it originally had a slot on ITV of just seventeen minutes per episode. TPTV has it in a 65-minute slot, so what it's all about and where the extra half hour of content comes from remains to be seen.

We can only hope that at some point during the season that the BFI shows the Adam & Joe take on Mark Cousins' Scene by Scene series that was part of their series of stuffed toy parodies of film culture!

Rather quiet next week. Aside from a couple of Channel 5 TV movies, the only two big premieres have already been noted by jlnight with the Tom Hanks starring A Man Named Otto on Channel 4 at 9 p.m. on Saturday 12th, which is a remake of a Swedish film A Man Called Ove. Although it also seems to be in the 'aging stars acting curmudgeonly before getting their hard hearts melted' trend of the likes of As Good As It Gets and Gran Torino, etc.

And at the other end of the week is Babylon on Film4 at 9:30 p.m. on Friday 18th. Which by the recent surge of comments on the forum thread looks to be divisive. Dark 'n' moody take on an old song ahoy!
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Nothing really notable in the repeats either other than The Innocents as jlnight noted showing on Film 4 on Saturday 12th at 11: 30 p.m. - Channel 4/Film4 are showing a lot of South Asian films across the week, but they are the exact same films that were shown in last year's schedule, so that is rather disappointing.

GaryC wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 1:14 pm
TPTV's online schedule is blank for this. It appears to be a two-part edition of Picture Box from 1981, though going by the TV & Radio Database it originally had a slot on ITV of just seventeen minutes per episode. TPTV has it in a 65-minute slot, so what it's all about and where the extra half hour of content comes from remains to be seen.

One listing describes it as a "documentary about people who live and work in the Sahara Desert, with a look at the means of transport used to travel across the vast wilderness". No year, no other info, but it fits the type of programme the channel shows.

BBC4 showed a decent copy of the Moviedrome intro to Don't Look Now.
I hope the BFI audiences enjoy the donated intros! I think Get Carter and Two-Lane Blacktop have already been shown. And Walker.

Oh God, A Man Called Otto is a weirdly offensively inoffensive film, which in its twee attempts to throw every possible social issue into the mix sends out a strangely disturbing message. Otto is a grumpy guy officiously ruling over his gated estate and all of the rule breaking neighbours within until we get flashbacks throughout the course of the film which show that he was a decent person all along and just depressed and wanting to join his dead wife in the grave sooner rather than later. The problem here is less the 'we're all in it together, so let's not make the world harder for each other to live in' message, as well as the 'everyone has their reasons' one, but more the far too blunt handling of everything, spelling everything out in explicit detail rather than using subtlety and allusion, which is what would have made the story much more powerful.

We get every current zeitgeist issue dealt with here, smashed together: the white guy who lords it over his majority ethnic neighbours (though that immediately gets softened into the main character never being racist, just exasperated by his neighbours constantly relying on him to do everything for them; which itself gets softened by the black neighbour friend Reuben with end stage dementia who in better days Otto used to co-caretake the estate with); the friend unable to end his own life, as well as Otto's depression, gets into ideas of assisted suicide, or rather taking the quicker route out before being unable to do so and being left to the mercy of estranged sons and the uncaring members of the Housing Association deciding on enforced moves into care homes; there is the loss of a baby with Otto's wife losing it in a bus accident versus the fecund newly arrived Latino family with Marisol having a third child on the way that inevitably has to arrive near the climax of the film (yes, she does scream out "Ay, Caramba!" during her labour pains), and also involves Otto giving the long held cot from his thwarted own baby to Marisol for her own use; Otto's wife post-bus accident is left wheelchair-bound as well as barren, and there is a throwaway mention of that being the reason for Otto being thrown out of officially running the Housing Association, because he reacted angrily in a meeting to ask for wheelchair accessible ramps to be put in the houses; there is an Inside Llewellyn Davis-style stray cat to both reflect and melt the main character's gruff exterior; and in the most shoehorned in subplot of the film the local delivery boy comes by on his bicycle and mentions that Otto's late wife was the only teacher in his high school that accepted and celebrated him for being transgender, and then that character later on comes by (averting Otto's latest suicide attempt) to ask for shelter after his father throws him out of the house for having revealed that.

None of it particularly rings true, and every single issue gets raised in such an obvious and blunt way that it feels more eye-rolling than naturally occurring. Even Otto's grumpiness and lack of social skills is more implied to be a kind of autism (as we see in the flashbacks to his developing romance where his girlfriend-to-turn-wife is the only one who understands and calms him) rather than just being an incorrigible asshole - in fact the film goes out of its way to portray Otto always as a good person being beset by life in the form of neighbours and obligations (even cats), when all he wants the most is to take his leave of it all, and despite his protestations he is always the bedrock of the community, even to the extent in the final act of the film of being the central figure who can organise a full resistance against the Housing Association moving his friend and wife out of their home and into a care home by bringing together other neighours and the 'social media journalist' who has been stalking him since his previous failed suicide attempt turned into an impromptu rescue situation, to break the story of local injustice from an inflexible organisation.

I presume that this is all meant to be taken at face value, but if there is a subversive aspect to the film it is perhaps that it does (accidentally?) make the people surrounding Otto seem like the most awful people because of their constant impositions - they painfully drag him back to a life of engagement and feeling, but to what end? Is it all eventually just for their own conveniences rather than Otto's? Marisol in particular doesn't take no for an answer in her interactions with Otto (which then twists into petulantly being angry at him for having shut her out when he wants her practical help later on), and the lack of any kind of personal boundaries seems to be a general feature here.

There is a car metaphor running throughout the film, which feels like the most important throughline - I presume it is about the individualism that the car implies (interestingly the accident in which Otto and his wife are caught up in is one where they are both passengers in a bus rather than in a car accident, so Otto is not in control, or responsible, for driving the vehicle in that situation and just has to react to the tragedy), as well as ideas of the models of cars being replaced as they age for newer, slicker models, but eventually suddenly fully replaced by ones without any throughline of community. In the early flashback scene talking to his girl about his interests Otto talks in autistic detail about loving learning about fixing cars as his single big interest; Otto is exasperated at the corporate estate owner leaving the gated entrance to the private road open, which suggests Otto's officiousness as well as the lack of care shown by the 'real' owners; then there is the destroyed relationship between Otto and Reuben which begins friendly enough over some petty Chevrolet versus Ford rivalry but eventually culminates in Reuben forsaking American-made cars altogether for a Japanese one (his estranged son having moved to Japan), which is beyond the pale for Otto, who breaks the friendship off at that point; and then the throughline of Otto teaching Marisol to drive eventually leads to him bequeathing his truck to her (and his other car to the transgender kid).

This may be an uncharitable interpretation, but the impression I was generally left with was not a particularly good one. There is only one inevitable end to this film, and it involves the waiting game for nature to take its course instead of a suicidal Otto dying by other means. It is very hard not to see the social/racial politics aspect of this film as being the old decrepit (and childless, so no one close left to continue his legacy - indeed in the Reuben subplot a blood relative son is only seen as an estranged, bordering on callous figure who has never bothered to visit their ailing father for over a decade) white guy who is angry at the betrayals of the world towards his hopes and dreams, rather than spoiling everyone's day by selfishly suddenly taking himself out without warning and leaving the community in the lurch instead fulfilling his function as bedrock of the society and fixing all of the problems that his neighbours either cannot or do not have the resources of their own to fix themselves, whilst also acting as a hostel taking in both stray cats and transgender waifs alike. Once he gets them all back on their feet and relatively secure then he is allowed to die, his societal function now completed. He still ends up in the grave either way, as a symbol of the old world being swept away; and needing to be removed in order to make space for the new communities to take his place, with all of his possessions being transferred to (the more deserving?) Marisol and her family as well. Even the cat.

(Oh, and the most amusing/most awful part of the film is Otto's late-on revealed deus ex machina heart condition being one which involves his heart being revealed to 'just be too large'. Which Marisol bursts into laughter in the hospital room at hearing at the irony of this irascible grump having a big heart, but as mentioned in the 'goodbye note' at the end of the film, sometimes being big hearted can in itself be its own fatal flaw)

The Searchers, Sat 19th July, BBC2.
One-Eyed Jacks, Sat 19th July, 5Action. (ex-Moviedrome)
The Deadly Affair (1967), Sat 19th July, Talking Pictures. (on before)

Sabata + Return of Sabata, Sun 20th July, Great Action. Or...
The Hired Hand, Sun 20th July, 5Action. (ex-Moviedrome)
The Wolf of Wall Street, Sun 20th July, BBC2.

Girls Galore (short), Mon 21st July, Talking Pictures.

Omen (Augure, 2023), late Wed 23rd July, Film4.

Love and Pain and The Whole Damn Thing, Thu 24th July, Talking Pictures. or...
Gosford Park (+ intro), Thu 24th July, BBC4.

The Over-the-Hill Gang Rides Again (1970 TVM), Fri 25th July, Rewind TV.
The Hitch-Hiker, late Fri 25th July, Talking Pictures. (ex-Moviedrome)

Another relatively quiet week, though with a few items of interest. The premiere of Ant-Man and the Wasp on BBC1 at 7:10 p.m. on Friday 25th is the highest profile film of the week. The big foreign language film premiere is Omen on Film4 at 1:50 a.m. in the early hours of Thursday 24th.

And tucked away on the "Legend" digital channel is the premiere of Trading Paint at 9 p.m. on Thursday 24th, with John Travolta, Shania Twain(!) and the late Michael Madsen.
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Repeat-wise BBC4 is doing a tribute to Helen Mirren in honour of her 80th birthday on Thursday 24th, which is has a new 15 minute introduction by Mirren to Gosford Park at 9 p.m.

BBC4's 'archive television' strand shows the most interesting item of the week though on Wednesday 23rd, with Partrick Marber introducing at 10 p.m. a screening of Marber's play "After Miss Julie", which had been part of the BBC's "Performance" strand of filmed plays. I am really glad that more of the "Performance" strand is finally being shown again.

Wild Bill (1995), Sat 26th July, Great Action. Or...
The Executioner (1970), Sat 26th July, Talking Pictures. Or...
Fallen Leaves, Sat 26th July, BBC4.

The Little Minister (1975 BBC TVM), Sun 27th July, BBC4. Or...
The Long Haul (1957), Sun 27th July, Talking Pictures.

The Big Bluff (1955), Wed 30th July, Talking Pictures.
Cottage to Let, Wed 30th July, Talking Pictures.
The War Game (1965) + Threads (+ intros), Wed 30th July, BBC4. Or...
Broker (2022), Wed 30th July, Film4. Or...
The Lost World (1925), late Wed 30th July, Rewind TV.
One for the Road, late Wed 30th July, Film4.

The Heart Within, Thu 31st July, Talking Pictures.

Lighthouse (1947), Fri 1st Aug, Talking Pictures.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Fri 1st Aug, Legend. (on before, ex-Moviedrome)


It Rained Three Times Last Year was produced by Jacscam, directed by one Claude R. Camredon, photographed by Jacques Piquerez (Jac-Cam?) and, big clue, was edited by Noel Cronin. This answers why it was shown. Jacscam appear to have 3 or 4 other credits, including docs about the Sahara and greyhound racing, produced between 1975 and 1980. There is no specific date for this film but it was probably from this same time period. It only lasts about 50 mins so was likely pitched for television.

When was the last time that The War Game was shown on the BBC? The last Peter Watkins in general I remember was a surprise appearance of Culloden on BBC2 back in April 1996, and I think that only occurred because it was the 250th anniversary of the battle!

colinr0380 wrote: Tue Jul 01, 2025 9:44 pm The big event of the week though is BBC4 doing a tribute to Moviedrome on Thursday 10th July. The films being shown are nothing too exciting, just the original Wicker Man and Don't Look Now again, but they are going to be shown with their original Moviedrome introductions for the first time since their original broadcast. jlnight brought this up to me a few days ago that there is a BFI Southbank season of Moviedrome films with their original introductions showing throughout July and August, so this must be the BBC's contribution to tie in with that season. The 1988 Alex Cox introduction to The Wicker Man was the very first Moviedrome introduction, showing the director's cut version of the film on television for the first time, and that is followed at the other end of the series by Mark Cousins' 2000 introduction to Don't Look Now, during his 'white void' period (which was the one that was providing the initial suggestion that the BBC were giving up on Moviedrome by having Cousins do all of his links in a studio rather than in evocative locations as had previously characterised the series. The other sign that the BBC were giving up on the series was also that the final series was the one in which they did not show the best available versions of the films they screened - most notably in Cousins talking up a half hour longer 'director's cut' version of Luc Besson's Leon, and then we got the theatrical version, pan-and-scanned to add to the indignity! And Jackie Chan's Rumble in the Bronx was also shown pan-and-scanned and dubbed into English. Although to balance it out even in that final year there were screenings of Clubbed To Death and the surprisingly little shown since Jack Nicholson and Michael Caine team up Blood & Wine to savour).

Amusingly, as Cox says in his introduction, The Wicker Man was cut down on its original theatrical release to act as the second half of a double bill with... Don't Look Now. So in addition to the Moviedrome tribute, the BBC have cheekily recreated the theatrical release of the films here!

Here's the BFI discussion about Moviedrome with Nick Freand Jones and Alex Cox.

The clips mentioned that get cut out of the discussion, in order that they get mentioned:
the Film Club introduction to The Long Goodbye by Cox
Barry Norman on RoboCop
Moviedrome: Sunset Boulevard
Moviedrome: The Terminator (interestingly the film was not shown for the first time uncut on UK television until a few years after that, in Robert McKee's Filmworks series in 1993!) - Also if they wanted examples of Cox being a bit disgusted by modern cinema violence, the two big ones that come to mind are the Moviedrome introduction to Darkman and the Forbidden Weekend intro to Bad Taste
(NB: re: Samira Ahmed's mention of the controversy about it, The Last Temptation of Christ was shown in Channel 4's "Century of Cinema" season in 1995)
Moviedrome: 200 Motels
Moviedrome: Assault on Precinct 13
(The mention of the locations and having a 'San Francisco season' is presumably the one where they did the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers on location at the Transamerica Pyramid. And the 'Hungary season' is presumably Cox's final one in 1994 with titles like Contempt and Apartment Zero - love the slightly bored hairdresser looking on in that intro!)
Moviedrome trailer from 1997 introducing Mark Cousins
Moviedrome: Exotica
Kennedy Night: The Parallax View

colinr0380 wrote: Sun Jul 20, 2025 12:37 pm When was the last time that The War Game was shown on the BBC? The last Peter Watkins in general I remember was a surprise appearance of Culloden on BBC2 back in April 1996, and I think that only occurred because it was the 250th anniversary of the battle!

I believe the only previous showing of The War Game was on 31 July 1985, as part of a season marking the fortieth anniversary of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. So now I guess it's for the eightieth?

I was in the audience for the BFI Moviedrome discussion, though at a different angle to the stage than the cameras.

Great stuff, Colin!

Moviedrome locations:

1988: studio in Television Centre (Film Club intros in the Lloyd's building)
1989: Arizona
1990: Spain
1991: LA (concreted LA River, Chateau Marmont, Santa Monica Pier, etc.)
1992: New York
1993: San Francisco (Escape From Alcatraz of course)
1994: Budapest
1997/98: ?
1998: ?
1999: Edinburgh
2000: white void studio