Feb 20th
Tunes of Glory***
GB 1960. United Artists/Knightsbridge. 107m.

The popular Colonel of a Scottish Highland Army Barracks clashes with his ruthless but slightly vulnerable successor.
A film that doesn't get shown on TV as much as it should - watched on DVD in this case - but well worth catching for two brilliant star performances that create a marvellous brooding power (in evocative surroundings), backed up by an excellent supporting cast.

Written by: James Kennaway, from his novel.
Producer: Colin Lesslie.
Director: Ronald Neame.
Starring: Alec Guinness, John Mills, Gordon Jackson, Dennis Price, Susannah York, Kay Walsh, John Fraser, Duncan MacRae, Percy Herbert, Richard Leech, Gerald Harper, Allan Cuthbertson, Fulton Mackay, Angus Lennie.
Photography: Arthur Ibbetson.
Music: Malcolm Arnold.

Feb 19th
Small Hotel*
GB 1957. ABPC. 59m. bw

The shady veteran head waiter at a small guest house manages to manoeuvre his way out of being dismissed.
Slightly static (strongly resembling its stage origins) but satisfactory British B-feature, with some easily identifiable comic characters. A more genteel predecessor to Fawlty Towers.

Written by: Wilfred Eades, from the play by Rex Frost.
Producer: Robert Hall.
Director: David MacDonald.
Starring: Gordon Harker, Janet Munro, Marie Lohr, John Loder, Irene Handl, Billie Whitelaw, Francis Matthews, Ruth Trouncer.
Photography: Norman Warwick.
Musical Direction: Louis Levy.

Feb 18th
Eskimo Day**
GB/US TVM 1996. BBC/WGBH/Greenpoint Films. 85m.

Parents and students alike fret over University entrance interviews at Cambridge.
Quite droll and frequently rather touching comedy drama, plainly shot in grand Varsity city locations, with a good cast.

Written by: Jack Rosenthal.
Producer: Cathy Lord.
Director: Piers Haggard.
Starring: Maureen Lipman, Tom Wilkinson, Anna Carteret, James Fleet, Alec Guinness (last film), David Ross, Benedict Sandford, Laura Howard, Kathryn Pogson, Grant Warnock, Lila Kaye, Susannah Wise.
Photography: Michael Coulter.
Music: Dominic Muldowney.

Feb 15th
Romeo and Juliet**
GB 1968. Paramount/BHE. 132m. Panavision

Montagu's son Romeo falls for 14-year old Capulet daughter Juliet, and their subsequent marriage and tragic deaths belatedly unite the warring factions.
It looks stagy in some ways (especially the languid second half) but for the most part this is a beautifully vibrant and operatic treatment, with actors that benefit from resembling the actual age of the characters. Perhaps the definitive film version of Shakespeare's play.

Written by: Franco Brusati, Masolino D'Amieo, Franco Zefferelli, from the play by William Shakespeare.
Producers: Anthony Havelock-Allen, John Brabourne.Director: Franco Zeffirelli.Starring: Olivia Hussey, Leonard Whiting, John McEnery, Michael York, Milo O'Shea, Pat Heywood, Natasha Parry, Paul Hardwick, Robert Stephens, Bruce Robinson, Richard Warwick, Roberto Bisacco.
Narrator: Laurence Olivier.
Photography: Pasquale de Santis.
Music: Nino Rota.
Production Design: Renzo Mongiardino.

Feb 14th
Revolutionary Road** (15)
Rich Mix Centre, Bethnal Green

In 1950s America, a young couple try to break out of the everyday life that they had once sworn to defy.
Long and talky but well acted, similar in content to American Beauty but done here as grim drama rather than black comedy, re-uniting the stars of Titanic - who still however look as out of place in the 1950s as they did in 1912, something which the film over-compensates for by having them smoke cigarettes in nearly every scene.

d: Sam Mendes
s: Leonardo Di Caprio, Kate Winslet, Kathy Bates, Michael Shannon, Kathryn Hahn, David Harbour, Jay O. Sanders, Zoe Kazan






A decade after Titanic, the lovers from that film finally get to the New World, but a slightly more cynical one.

Feb 12th
Two Way Stretch**
GB 1960. British Lion. 87m. bw

Prison lags just about to be released hitch a scheme to rob a Sultan's jewels.
Proficient comedy heist with a reliable British cast, and a range of prison gags that made for a useful blueprint for the classic 70's TV series Porridge.

Written by: John Warren, Len Heath.
Producer: M. Smedley Aston.
Director: Robert Day.
Starring: Peter Sellers, Lionel Jeffries, Bernard Cribbins, David Lodge, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Liz Fraser, Irene Handl, Maurice Denham, George Woodbridge, Beryl Reid.
Photography: Geoffrey Faithfull.
Music: Ken Jones.

Preceded by:
From Soup to Nuts**
(US 1928. 20m. bw. silent; Two ramshackle waiters serve at a high society dinner.; w: H.M.Walker; d: Edgar Kennedy; s: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Anita Garvin, Tiny Sandford, Edna Marion; ph: Len Powers.)


FROM SOUP TO NUTS. A succession of amusing gags rather than a plot (as so many of the Laurel & Hardy shorts were) based around the kitchen, with Ollie falling over several banana skins, but done with their usual immaculate comedy timing.

Feb 4th
Closer**

US 2004. Columbia. 104m.

Series of mostly casual affairs between couples falling in and out of love in contemporary London.

The setting could be anywhere, as the matter-of-fact London locations are merely a background to the characters' shallow behaviour, in what is a surprisingly faithful adaptation of a coarse but coldly compelling character piece - including the notorious Internet chatroom scene - with top-notch talent (some of whom look a little uncomfortable with the material), a throwback to the director's previous Carnal Knowledge and other sex comedies of the 1960s/70s.

Written by: Patrick Marber, from his play.
Producers: Mike Nichols, John Calley, Cary Brokow.
Director: Mike Nichols.
Starring: Julia Roberts, Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Clive Owen.
Photography: Stephen Goldblatt.
Music: Damien Rice, and others.
Production Design: Tim Hatley.

Preceded by:
Karin's Face**
(Swe 1984. 15m. bw; Mesmerising portrait of Bergman's mother in old photographs, looking back after her death in 1964.; d: Ingmar Bergman.)