Michael Culver Movies

While it might not have been the best idea on earth to remake the 1939 classic Goodbye Mr. Chips as a musical, the end result is not altogether displeasing. Peter O'Toole steps into the old Robert Donat role of Arthur Chipping (originally Charles Chipping), a young by-the-book schoolmaster at a 1920s British boys school who is humanized by the love of good-natured music-hall singer Katherine Bridges (played by Petula Clark; Greer Garson essayed this role, then named Katherine Ellis, in the original). Though Chips must endure the tragedy of Katherine's death during the 1940 London blitz (a scene filmed from the bomb's point of view!), he is able to persevere by devoting himself to his young charges. In retrospect, this version of Goodbye Mr. Chips might have worked better without the songs, which never rise above banality. And though Petula Clark can't match the poignancy of Greer Garson's performance (in all fairness, she didn't have much of a script to work with), Peter O'Toole is terrific as the title character, convincingly ageing and mellowing as the story unfolds. Originally road-shown at 151 minutes, Goodbye Mr. Chips is today generally available in its 131-minute general-release version. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Several enemy agents escape from a top-security prison, determined to wreak vengeance against the persons responsible for their arrest. When two of Steed's friends are murdered by the escapees, he decides it is time to end the reign of terror once and for all. But the still-imprisoned leader of the enemy minions calmly informs Steed that he is next on the list -- and that his assassin will be completely invisble. Written by Philip Levene, "Get-a-Way" made its American TV debut on April 24, 1969, and its British TV bow on May 14 of that same year. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Produced by Britain's Trigor Pictures, Thin Air stars Patrick Allen as Bob Megan, an investigator called in to solve a bizarre mystery: During training courses, British parachutists are disappearing in a strange red mist, leaving no trace. Even more mysterious is the fact that they later turn up, with their bodies filled with lethal doses of radiation. Megan, aided by Jim Radford (Neil Connery, brother of Sean Connery), begins an investigation, which uncovers an unearthly beauty ($Lorna Wilde who somehow is incapable of being photographed. Eventually, Megan and Radford discover that the parachutists are being kidnapped by aliens from the planet Mygon, who use the men to try to impregnate Mygonian women, thereby saving their dying civilization. Unfortunately, a side effect of this plan seems to be the irradiation of the earthlings. [%Megan exposes and foils the alien plan, but he also decides to lead an effort to discover a way of saving their race from extinction. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide

Like the earlier BBC anthology The Villains, the similarly titled Villains dramatized the lives of criminals both famous and obscure. Unlike the earlier series, which focused on England's North Country, the later program detailed stories about crooks and scoundrels from all parts of the British Isles, and from all walks of life. Bob Hoskins and Alun Armstrong were among the many major actors who appeared in the series' 13 hour-long episodes. Villains aired in Great Britain beginning July 22, 1972. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This is one of the programs, which are available separately, of the TV series based on the popular children's story of a beautiful black horse who is much abused by society in general. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide

When she's hired to nurse the daughter of an American ambassador, a woman begins influencing the girl's actions, as well as those of her two sisters. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide

Anthony Bate, Derek Jacobi, and Michael Culver star in director Gordon Flemyng's docudrama detailing the Russian spy scandal that rocked Great Britain at the absolute height of the Cold War. In the three decades after college buddies Kim Philby (Bate), Guy Burgess (Jacobi), and Donald MacLean (Culver) were recruited to work as Russian spies, each of the men maintained high-level government security posts. Later, after passing along valuable U.S. atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, the three double agents were exposed, ultimately defecting to the Soviet Union in order to escape prosecution. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

A Passage to India, director David Lean's final film (for which he also received editing credit), breaks no new ground cinematically, but remains an exquisitely assembled harkback to such earlier Lean epics as Doctor Zhivago and Ryan's Daughter. Based on the novel by E. M. Forster, the film is set in colonial India in 1924. Adela Quested (Judy Davis), a sheltered, well-educated British woman, arrives in the town of Chandrapore, where she hopes to experience "the real India". Here she meets and befriends Dr. Aziz (Victor Banerjee), who, despite longstanding racial and social taboos, moves with relative ease and freedom amongst highborn British circles. Feeling comfortable with Adela, Aziz invites her to accompany him on a visit to the Marabar caves. Adela has previously exhibited bizarre, almost mystical behavior during other ventures into the Indian wilderness: this time, she emerges from the caves showing signs of injury and ill usage. To Aziz' horror, he is accused by Adela of raping her. Typically, the British ruling class rallies to Adela's defense, virtually convicting Aziz before the trial ever begins. Though he is eventually acquitted due to lack of evidence (in fact, director Lean never shows us what really happened), Aziz is ruined in the eyes of both the British and his own people-as is Adela. Woven into these proceedings is a subplot involving Adela's elderly travelling companion Mrs. Moore (Peggy Ashcroft), who through a series of plot twists too complex to describe here becomes a heroine of the Indian Independence movement. A Passage to India was nominated for several Academy Awards, scoring wins in the categories of Best Supporting Actress (Peggy Ashcroft) and Best Original Score (Maurice Jarre). A theatrical version of A Passage to India, written by Santha Rama Rau, was previously adapted for television by the BBC in the mid-1970s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this follow-up to Cold War Killer, a government agent turns the tables on his would-be assassins and goes after them. ~ All Movie Guide

When several exemplary students at Oxford University are forced out amid mysterious circumstances, a man (Terence Stamp) begins to suspect the involvement of the Soviet KGB. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide

Twelfth century warrior-turned-monk Brother Cadfael (Derek Jacobi) tackles another murder mystery in the 90-minute drama "The Sanctuary Sparrow." A prominent goldsmith is robbed and murdered during his son's wedding. Accused of the crime, traveling juggler Walter (Roy Barraclough) takes refuge in Shrewbury Abbey. Believing in the juggler's innocence, Cadfael uses his scientific know-how to scrutinize the clues at hand -- and comes to the unpleasant conclusion that the actual murderer is someone he knows all too well. Adapted by Russell Lewis from the novel by Ellis Peters, "The Sanctuary Sparrow" aired in England on June 5, 1994, then ran in the U.S. as part of the PBS anthology Mystery. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide