Roy Castle Movies
British comedian and dancer Roy Castle's long, varied career encompassed work on stage, screen, radio, record albums, and much television. A native of West Yorkshire, Castle started out performing standup in stage variety shows. In 1958, he received favorable notice for his performance before the queen in the Royal Variety Show and this led to his television and recording career. That same year, his film career began with Hello London. Castle's subsequent film appearances included the fantasy-horror outing Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1964) opposite Peter Cushing and Legend of the Werewolf (1975), his last film appearance. On television, Castle headlined two series, The Roy Castle Show and Roy Castle Beats Time, as well as starring in BBC-TV's The Record Breakers. He also hosted his own radio series, Castle's on the Air. He retired from performing in 1992, due to illness. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide- 1975
- R
Peter Cushing stars as a police investigator whose search into a series of murders--committed during the full moon--leads him to a French zoo run by a strange keeper. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- 1968
The Carry On gang carries on with this 17th entry in the gang's never-ending series of lowbrow British comedy films. This time the Carry On crowd spoofs the stiff-upper-lip, "defending-the-Empire" epics of an earlier era. Comic opera British troops are sent to the Khyber Pass to prevent the local citizenry from discovering what's under the kilts of the Scottish Devil's Regiment. Series regulars Sidney James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey and Joan Sims are put through their usual risque paces by their usual director Gerald Thomas. This stirring historical saga was followed by the equally inspiring 1970 epic Carry On, Up the Jungle. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sidney James, Kenny Williams, (more)
- 1967
In this slapstick comedy two bumbling workmen attempt to take a long wooden plank through a London suburb to a building site. Mayhem ensues. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tommy Cooper, Eric Sykes, (more)
- 1966
No TV or movie producer has yet to resist the temptation of turning Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass into an all-star musical. Certainly the folks at ABC were unable to resist turning out the 1966 taped TV special Alice Through the Looking Glass, but the end result was so pleasing that we can forgive the network for succumbing to temptation. Newcomer Judy Rolin plays Alice, who passes through the mirror, undergoes numerous fantastic adventures with a variety of eccentric characters, and is finally crowned Queen of Wonderland. The stellar guest cast includes Ricardo Montalban, Nanette Fabray, Robert Coote and Agnes Moorehead. Best bits: Jimmy Durante as Humpty Dumpty, Tom and Dick Smothers as Tweedledum and Tweedledee, and Jack Palance as the Jabberwocky! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Dr. Who was/is the longest-running entertainment series ever to run on the BBC, and for a variety of reasons, including its sassy humor, delightfully idiotic sets and special effects, and some first-class star-turns by a series of usually underrated actors in the title role, it generated a fanatic and devoted following in the U.K. One of the earliest "Doctors" in the movies was the great horror favorite Peter Cushing, and in this movie he saves the universe and, not incidentally, our dear old earth, from domination by the mostly robot and decidedly anti-biological Daleks (predecessors of the Borg, no doubt), a group of endearingly awfully designed (and made) A-frame shaped robots which, when massed together, appear to be engaged in a bumper-car race. No matter, the story races along at a furious and improbable pace, punctuated by wisecracks and gags, most of them from the almost-wise Doctor himself as he races about in his infinitely large (on the inside) antique London telephone booth known as "the Tardis" (Time And Relative Dimensions In Space), protecting the innocent. Fans of the series will be delighted with the film, but as is so often the case, newcomers to the series will wonder what all the fuss is about. The cumulative cheesiness of the whole Dr. Who concept does take quite a bit of getting used to, and any attempt to take the series or this movie seriously is doomed to failure. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Cushing, Roy Castle, (more)
- 1965
Not to be confused with David Hewitt's abominable Dr. Terror's Gallery of Horrors (AKA The Blood Suckers), this clever horror omnibus is one of the better early anthologies from Amicus Productions, thanks to Freddie Francis' stylish direction and a tongue-in-cheek approach from writer Milton Subotsky (who would later apply the same sardonic treatment to the EC Comics-based productions Tales from the Crypt and The Vault of Horror). The framing story is set in a train car, where five passengers have their fortunes told by the all-seeing Dr. Schreck (Peter Cushing), who refers to his ominous tarot deck as his "House of Horrors." Their respective stories involve all manner of occult happenings: a jazz musician's involvement with a voodoo curse; an estate haunted by a werewolf; a doctor (Donald Sutherland) who suspects that his wife has become a vampire; a cottage besieged by a monster kudzu vine; and the most entertaining segment, in which arrogant art critic Christopher Lee is avidly pursued by a snubbed artist's severed hand. In the end, it doesn't take a jaded horror buff to deduce Schreck's true identity or the ultimate destination of the train passengers, but it's a fun ride nonetheless. Not all of the stories work (the vampire story's "twist" ending is rather silly, the voodoo tale painfully dated), and the effects are generally sub-par, but Francis keeps the pace snappy throughout, giving the entire film a throwaway, Halloween spook-house feel. Hammer horror fans will certainly find this a keeper on the strength of Cushing and Lee's performances. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, (more)
- 1958
Long, long, after her days of filmic glory in the 1930s and 1940s, skating star Sonja Henie made her last movie appearance in the British Hello, London. Henie plays herself, a rich-as-Croesus ice-show celebrity making a tour of Europe. Michael Wilding and Eunice Gayson contrive to keep Sonja in London long enough so that she'll feel obliged to perform at a charity function. Also appearing under their own names are such British showbiz luminaries as Ronnie Graham, Stanley Holloway and Dennis Price; in addition, Oliver Reed shows up in a surly bit part. In the spirit of Auld Lang Syne, Hello London was released in the US by Ms. Henie's longtime home studio, 20th Century-Fox. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
