Geoffrey Dunn Movies
- 2003
This documentary from filmmaker Geoffrey Dunn explores the history of calypso music in Trinidad and Tobago. Featuring performances by such seminal acts as Mighty Sparrow, Calypso Rose, Lord Superior, Brother Valentino, Regeneration Now, and Mystic Prowler, Calypso Dreams also includes archival footage of Calypso pioneers Grandmaster Kitchener and Lord Pretender. The winner of the Best Caribbean Documentary Film at the 2002 Jamerican Film Festival, the film also screened at the 2003 Mill Valley Film Festival. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mighty Sparrow, Calypso Rose, (more)
- 1989
Zandy (Dunja Djordjevic) is a college student who has to do a research paper on the old days of the fishing industry on the California coast. She seeks out Dominic (Bill Ackridge), an elderly Italian who still earns a meager living from his tiny boat, and goes out on the water with him. They see things very differently, but gradually become friends. Zandy finds the earthy Dominic attractive in a one-night stand sort of way, and Dominic entertains notions of romance for the young woman as well. However, what he would really like is a long-term relationship and a young woman to come home to. Eventually they sort out the complications, as the fisherman is a level-headed sort. This film originally swept through the festival circuit in 1989 as Maddalena Z, then received a theatrical release in 1991 under the title Voyage of the Heart. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bill Ackridge, Dunja Djordjevic, (more)
- 1987
This documentary follows the feminist protests against the Miss California pageant being held in Santa Cruz in 1985 and the arguments for and against beauty pageants. Among the issues examined is the esthetic which favors thin women and labels them as beautiful, denying that epithet for normal and full-figured women. The history of ideals of feminine beauty in America, and the role that beauty pageants have played in establishing the norms for it is another issue. In the short run, the protestors, who included a former model among them, won. The pageant was held somewhere else. However, the larger issues guiding the protest have never been addressed in any serious way, and most media coverage of such dissent has pictured the protesting feminists as merely colorful, strident, out of touch with American values, or even deluded ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1964
In this lively British comedy, a newlywed couple's quaint country cottage becomes a nightmare of repairs as they try to fix it up themselves. They originally purchased the ramshackle pile to escape the influence of the new wife's meddlesome father. Unfortunately, the place needs more help than they are able to give and they must reluctantly get her father's help. He brings in a bumbling builder and things only get worse from there. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Leslie Phillips, Stanley Baxter, (more)
- 1964
Adapted from the internationally successful theatrical piece by Laurence Housman, the British TV miniseries Victoria Regina starred Patricia Routledge as Queen Victoria. The part proved to be as much a tour de force for Routledge as it had been for Helen Hayes in the original Broadway and London production: Enacting four different episodes in the life of the titular British Queen (individual titles: "Spring," "Summer," "Autumn," "Winter"), Routledge was required to age over 60 years, from naïve young monarch to wizened dowager. Also in the cast were Max Adrian as Prime Minister Disraeli and Joachim Hansen as Victoria's beloved consort Prince Albert. Victoria Regina was broadcast from November 13 to December 4, 1964. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Patricia Routledge, Max Adrian, (more)
Cornel Wilde co-produces, directs, and stars with his wife Jean Wallace in this uneven version of fabled King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Wilde, a skilled fencer, is Lancelot and appropriately enough, Wallace is his lady-love Guinevere. This time around, their traditionally chaste romance (Guinevere marries King Arthur) takes on a more modern veneer as she and Lancelot become intimate. Aside from their love story, several battles on horseback keep the knights busy as King Arthur struggles to hold onto his throne in the face of a challenge from King Leodogran (John Longdon). ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Cornel Wilde, Jean Wallace, (more)
- 1963
A bomb planted in a maternity home must be defused by an injured bomb-disposal expert and some volunteers. ~ All Movie Guide
- 1963
Dot (Rita Tushingham) is a girl who marries motorcycle maven Reggie (Colin Campbell) to escape her parents' influence. The marriage gets off to a rocky start and completely slides downhill after the honeymoon is plagued by bad weather. Dot refuses to have anything to do with household responsibilities and cooks only canned beans. Reggie loses interest in sex with Dot because of her actions, and after moving in with his grandmother, he begins to hang around Pete (Dudley Sutton). The two friends ride their motorcycles and begin to spend even more time together, and eventually Reggie realizes that Pete is a homosexual. Dot tells Reggie she is pregnant in an attempt to get him back -- with no result, but when Reggie comes home to find his wife in bed with another man, he decides to go off to sea with Pete. Pete leaves Reggie shaken and alone when he goes off with a group of sailors out to satisfy their same-sex lust. The film was controversial at the time of its initial release. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rita Tushingham, Colin Campbell, (more)
- 1955
Julie Harris repeats her stage portrayal of the irrepressible Sally Bowles in John Van Druten's I Am a Camera. Set in pre-Hitler Berlin, the film details the curious, chaste relationship between Sally, an entertainer at a bawdy nightclub, and fledgling writer Christopher Isherwood (Lawrence Harvey). Shelley Winters co-stars as Natalia Landauer, whose impending marriage to a wealthy young Jewish man is imperiled by the anti-Semitism which envelops Berlin as the Nazis gain political power. If all this sounds familiar to you, it is because I Am a Camera is the non-musical precursor to the Broadway musical hit Cabaret. Both properties were based on Christopher Isherwood's Berlin Stories. Those familiar with the film version of Cabaret will notice that certain plot elements have been watered down in Camera. Examples: Isherwood's homosexuality is left unmentioned, save for Lawrence Harvey's opaque opening comment that he is "a confirmed bachelor;" and Sally Bowles' third-act abortion is changed into a false-alarm pregnancy. Also, Julie Harris' dynamic but rather overbaked interpretation of Sally is not nearly as memorable as Liza Minelli's Oscar-winning interpretation of the character in Cabaret. Still, I Am a Camera is well directed and deftly adapted for the screen (by John Collier); and even taking into consideration Ms. Harris' hamminess, she remains one of the most fascinating stage personalities of the mid-20th century. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Julie Harris, Laurence Harvey, (more)
This waterlogged adaptation of an obscure Grand Guignol stage play finds a hapless couple (Dermot Walsh and Hazel Court) convinced that their newly-acquired yacht is haunted by mysterious and deadly forces. After numerous fatalities, the couple eventually hires a paranormal investigator (John Robinson), who uncovers the yacht's bloody history and determines that the craft is occupied by the vengeful ghosts of the former owner's wife and her lover, who were murdered and subsequently entombed somewhere aboard. Writer-producer-director Vernon Sewell -- who filmed most of the scenes aboard his own private yacht -- executes a few interesting paranormal twists on the Old Dark House scenario, and he would revisit the seagoing thriller theme (on the same boat) somewhat less successfully with Terror Ship two years later. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dermot Walsh, Hazel Court, (more)
Originally advertised as "Colossal Quo Vadis," this opulent MGM production is far and away the most elaborate of the many versions of Henryk Sienkiewicz' novel. The plot, as always, concerns the romance between a beautiful early Christian woman (Deborah Kerr) and the initially agnostic Roman soldier Marcus Vinicius (Robert Taylor). This love story is laid against the larger intrigues of the debauched emperor Nero (Peter Ustinov), who hopes to gain immortality by destroying Rome with a fire and remaking it in his own image. Part of Nero's master plan is the elimination of the Christian "threat," leading to the climactic lion picnics in the arena. In spite of the many more celebrated highlights (the burning of Rome, the rescue of Lygia [Deborah Kerr] from a rampaging bear, the upside-down crucifixion of Simon Peter), the scene that remains most vivid in the memory is the posthumous "final insult" delivered to Nero by his contemptuous former aide Petronius (Leo Genn). Sophia Loren can be briefly spotted as an extra during one of the crowd scenes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Taylor, Deborah Kerr, (more)
- 1949
British novelist Erik Linklater was well-represented in 1949, with adaptations of two of his best novels hitting the screen almost simultaneously. In Linklater's Poet's Pub, a rhyme-spinner named Saturday Keith (Derek Bond) assumes control of a rustic inn. All Keith wants is a little peace and quiet so that he can write his poems without interruption. Alas, his little Pub becomes a veritable Grand Central Station for a wide variety of eccentrics, ranging from absent-minded professors to bumbling crooks. Stealing the show is the peerless Joyce Grenfell as a toothy patroness of the arts. Poet's Pub has no real plot to speak of, just a series of vignettes unified by a central locale. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Derek Bond, Rona Anderson, (more)
- 1947
Director Anthony Asquith's first postwar effort, While the Sun Shines was based on a play by frequent Asquith collaborator Terence Rattigan. Set in WW2 London, the story revolves around Lady Elizabeth Randall (Barbara White), who is serving her country as an Air Force corporal. While en route to her marriage to the Earl of Harpenden (Ronald Howard, in his screen debut), Lady Elizabeth is wooed a French expatriate named Colbert (Michael Allen) and American lieutenant Joe Mulvaney (the inevitable Bonar Colleano). The resulting series of sexual misunderstandings puts Lady Elizabeth's military career-not to mention her impending marriage-in dire jeopardy. A harmless romantic farce, While the Sun Shines is generally out of favor with Anthony Asquith's many adherents. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Barbara White, Ronald Squire, (more)
