Alex Jennings Movies

The small town gossip, secrets, and romance of Mary Gaskells' popular series of novels comes to the small screen in this BBC drama series from director Simon Curtis. The year is 1842, and Cranford is a modest Cheshire market town on the verge of great change. The railway is reaching to Cranford from Manchester, and the locals fear that their town will soon be overrun with migrant workers and lawlessness. Spinster Deborah Jenkins Eileen Atkins) is the arbitrator of correctness about town, and as far as she and her demurring sister Matty (Judi Dench) are concerned there's never a dull moment in Cranford. Things begin to get especially interesting after handsome new doctor Frank Harrison (Simon Woods) arrives in town shocking the locals with his decidedly non-traditional methods of practicing medicine. Frank has a powerful effect on the ladies around town, but when Matty runs into an old flame at Lady Ludlow's garden party her thoughts drift back to the time when she was forced to give up the man she once loved with all her heart. No one is immune from the gossip that winds its way through the local circuits, and that gossip can almost always be traced back to the Jenkins sisters. When news emerges that the railroad is coming to town, everyone realizes that their tidy little universe is about to expand in ways that they could have never imagined. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

The British prime minister and the Royal Family find themselves quietly at odds in the wake of a national tragedy in this drama from director Stephen Frears. On August 31, 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales died in an auto accident in Paris; despite the controversial breakup of her marriage to Prince Charles, she was still one of the most famous and best-loved women in the world, and the public outpouring of emotion over her passing was immediate and intense. However, given the messy circumstances of Diana's breakup with Charles, official spokespeople for the Royal Family were uncertain about how to publicly address her passing. It didn't take long for the media to pick up on the hesitation of Buckingham Palace to pay homage to Diana, and many saw this as a sign of the cool emotional distance so often attributed to the royals, which in this case was widely seen as an insult against Diana and the many people who loved her. Prime Minister Tony Blair (played by Michael Sheen) saw a potential public-relations disaster in the making, and took it upon himself to persuade Queen Elizabeth II (played by Helen Mirren) to make a statement in tribute to the fallen Diana -- an action that went against the taciturn queen's usual nature. The Queen was released the same year that Helen Mirren played Queen Elizabeth I in an acclaimed miniseries for British television; The Queen also gave Michael Sheen his second opportunity to play Tony Blair after portraying the prime minister in the television film The Deal. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Based on author Helen Fielding's sequel to Bridget Jones's Diary, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason picks up four weeks after the original film left off, with Bridget (Renée Zellweger) emotionally satisfied at long last with Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), her barrister boyfriend. Stability in Bridget's life, however, quickly becomes a contradiction in terms. Though Mark is openly supportive of Bridget's eccentricities -- and there are many -- she is nonetheless threatened by Mark's young, nubile intern, not to mention irked at finding out that he is, among other less desirable qualities in her eyes, a conservative voter. Complicating issues further is the reentrance of her ex-lover, Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant), whom Jones, perhaps mistakenly, thought she had finally gotten over. Before long, the situation escalates into another series of embarrassing circumstances for Bridget, who is faced once again with a crippling feeling of self-doubt and has only her diary and friends to combat it. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide

The true story of the world's first submarine and its maritime usage by the Confederacy during the U.S. Civil War. ~ All Movie Guide

Renowned theatrical director Adrian Noble directed the Royal Shakespeare Company's mid-'90s stage production and helmed this film adaptation of that version. Its 1999 video release was apparently to coincide with Michael Hoffman's higher-profile feature of the same year. The setting is very theatrical in nature, with nearly all of the scenes taking place on a theater stage. The story is also bookmarked by a child (Osheen Jones), who is apparently dreaming all of the events, and also appears frequently in most of the scenes. Hyppolyta/Titania (Lindsey Duncan) and Theseus/Oberon (Alex Jennings) drive the plot with their romantic bickering, which stems from the romantic foursome of Demetrius (Kevin Doyle), Hermia (Monica Dolan), Lysander (Daniel Evans), and Helena (Emily Raymond). Lysander and Hermia are in love, but Hermia is promised to Demetrius by Hermia's father, Egeus. Helena, who is Hermia's best friend, is in love with Demetrius, but Demetrius loathes her. As one would expect, Lysander and Demetrius are very hostile towards one another. Hyppolyta feels strongly for Hermia and Lysander' case and becomes angry with Theseus when he takes Egeus' part in the predicament. Lysander and Hermia flee, Demetrius pursues, and is, in turn, pursued by Helena. The foursome then encounter the fairy kingdom, led by Oberon and Titania. Oberon orders his lackey, Puck (Barry Lynch), to cast a spell on Titania as a form of retribution for an argument the royal pair are currently having. Oberon also commands Puck to place the same spell on Demetrius, whom he has witnessed scorning Helena. However, due to miscommunication, Puck enchants Lysander instead. The scene becomes hectic, with enchantments and miscommunication abounding. At one point, Helena becomes the focus of love from both Demetrius and Lysander, while Hermia assumes the scorned woman role. Meanwhile, Titania has been forced to become infatuated with a mortal named Bottom (Desmond Barrit), whom Puck has enchanted with an ass head. By movie's end, however, all is straightened out. The fairy rulers reconcile and the mortal couples are united in marriage. At the wedding party, Theseus and his minions are entertained by the Pyramus and Thisbe play as performed by the rude mechanicals headed by Bottom. The Pyramus and Thisbe play-within-a-play is traditionally one of the highlights of the piece, but seems to lack some focus in this treatment. As films go, this is standard fare, technically speaking. In relation to other filmed versions of A Midsummer Night's Dream, however, few are more enjoyable. ~ Ryan Shriver, All Movie Guide

When first telecast in Britain in 1991, Ashenden consisted of four hour-long episodes. When the production was shown over America's A&E cable service on June 7 and 8, 1993, the four episodes were combined into two, with a brace of stories offered in each 2-hour dollop. In A&E's second installment of Ashenden (see entry 123760 for details on the first), our hero, a British playwright-cum-WWI secret agent, travels to Russia with an American businessman (Rene Auberjonois) on the eve of the Bolshevik revolution. He then becomes fed up with the whole espionage business upon meeting an American war widow in Italy. Alex Jennings is starred as Ashenden, a thinly disguised version of Somerset Maugham himself. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The first BBC television film to be given a British theatrical release, Derek Jarman's War Requiem is a cinematic interpretation of composer Benjamin Britten's famed oratorio. Narrated by Lord Laurence Olivier, whose last film this was, War Requiem combines Britten's music with the words of English poet (and World War 1 casualty Wilfred Owen) and Jarman's stark, symbolic images--filmed, appropriately enough, in an old mental hospital. Throughout, the sacrifice of young lives to the horrors of war is likened to the Supreme Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. As always, Jarman uses every opportunity to poke holes in Brtain's hidebound traditionalism. Though unrated, the violence quotient in War Requiem is enough to render the film unsuitable for young children. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide