James Dyrenforth Movies

In this wartime espionage drama, two incarcerated safecrackers are released to help Naval Intelligence steal classified Japanese documents following the attack on Pearl Harbor. The documents are hidden in the Japanese embassy in Lisbon. Once there, the crooks learn that the papers are worth a bundle so after the mission is completed, one of the thieves attempts to steal them for himself. He ends up killed by their Lisbon contact, who absconds with the documents himself. He too gets killed and the Navy finally gets the papers. Meanwhile the other safecracker is caught by the Japanese and held captive on a ship. When it is torpedoed, the thief is saved and receives a presidential pardon for his heroism. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

"How did they make a movie out of Lolita?" teased the print ads of this Stanley Kubrick production. The answer: by adding three years to the title character's age. The original Vladimir Nabokov novel caused no end of scandal by detailing the romance between a middle-aged intellectual and a 12-year-old nymphet. The affair is "cleansed" ever so slightly in the film by making Lolita a 15-year-old (portrayed by 16-year-old Sue Lyon). In adapting his novel to film, Nabokov downplayed the wicked satire and sensuality of the material, concentrating instead on the story's farcical aspects. James Mason plays professor Humbert Humbert, who while waiting to begin a teaching post in the United States rents a room from blowzy Shelley Winters. Winters immediately falls for the worldly Humbert, but he only has eyes for his landlady's nubile daughter Lolita. The professor goes so far as to marry Winters so that he can remain near to the object of his ardor. Turning up like a bad penny at every opportunity is smarmy TV writer Quilty (Peter Sellers), who seems inordinately interested in Humbert's behavior. When Winters happens to read Humbert's diary, she is so revolted by his lustful thoughts that she runs blindly into the street, where she is struck and killed by a car. Without telling Lolita that her mother is dead, Humbert packs her into the car and goes on a cross-country trip, dogged every inch of the way by a mysterious pursuer. Once she gets over the shock of her mother's death, Lolita is agreeable to inaugurating an affair with her stepfather (this is handled very, very discreetly, despite the slavering critical assessments of 1962). But when the girl begins discovering boys her own age, she drifts away from Humbert. One day, she leaves without warning. This is humiliation enough for Humbert; but when he discovers who her secret lover really is, the results are fatal. We are prepared for the ending because the film has been framed as a flashback; what we are not prepared for is Stanley Kubrick's adroit manipulation of our sympathies and expectations. An incredibly long film considering its subject matter, Lolita is never dull, nor does it ever stoop to the sensationalism prevalent in the film's ad campaign. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This is an uneven though occasionally hilarious comedy about a remote British colony and diplomatic blunders. Terry-Thomas as a British diplomat and Peter Sellers as a nasty, vile Prime Minister on the island, tend to overshadow the roles they are playing. Carlton-Browne (Terry-Thomas) is sent to the remote island of Gaillardia to prevent any other powers from tapping into its potentially rich mineral deposits. The fact that the Brits have ignored Gaillardia for the last fifty years or that Carlton-Browne is a walking disaster does not stop the Foreign Office. Circumstances quickly spin out of control as the island colony heads toward revolution with a new, young king (Ian Bannen) on the throne. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This meticulous re-creation of the sinking of the Titanic was adapted by Eric Ambler from the best-selling book by Walter Lord, and it preceded the blockbuster Titanic by almost 40 years. The film covers the life and death of the huge vessel from its launching celebration to that fateful night of April 14, 1912, when the "unsinkable" ship struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic. Of the 2224 passengers on board, 1513 were drowned as a result of the bad planning of lifeboats and escape routes. Kenneth More heads a huge and stellar cast, with 200 speaking parts, as second officer Herbert Lightoller, from whose point-of-view the story unfolds. Also in the cast are Laurence Naismith as the ill-fated Captain Smith; Michael Goodliffe as conscience-stricken ship's designer Thomas Andrews; Tucker McGuire as feisty American millionaire Molly Brown, whose courage and tenacity saved many lives; and Anthony Bushell as the captain of the Carpathia, who launched a noble but vain rescue mission once he was apprised of the disaster. Also appearing are two future TV favorites: The Avengers' Honor Blackman as a woman who believes that she has nothing to live for, and The Man From UNCLE's David McCallum as a wireless operator. The climactic sinking of the vessel is re-created with painstaking accuracy; filmed in "real time," it is a mere 37 minutes shorter than the actual tragedy. Two years before the film's release, an American TV adaptation of A Night to Remember set a precedent as the most elaborate and technically complex "live" broadcast of its time. Some viewers will find this movie a more accurate and gripping representation of this sea disaster than the romance-heavy Titanic. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this offbeat spy drama, an opera diva is suspected of leaking classified information for enemy spies. To see if this is true, a talented policeman is engaged to go undercover as a chorus member. While there, he finds himself the object of another singer's affections. Trouble ensues because the diva also falls for him and the two singers become bitter rivals. Eventually the other singer proves that all suspicions were correct--the prima donna really is a spy. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide