Gertan Klauber Movies

The Beatles' early days as a struggling bar band are depicted in this fact-based drama, which tells the little-known story of original member Stuart Sutcliffe (Stephen Dorff). A close friend of John Lennon, Sutcliffe acts as the band's original bassist, accompanying them on their early gigs in Liverpool and Hamburg, Germany. The friendship becomes strained, however, when Sutcliffe falls in love with a German art student and starts to question his commitment to the band. With Sutcliffe's story taking center stage, the stories of the more famous Beatles largely fade into the background. The exception is John Lennon, thanks to a fierce performance by Ian Hart, who had previously portrayed the musician in the more intimate and provocative The Hours and the Times. While Backbeat does provide a new perspective on the band's beginning, and numerous opportunities for a group of modern rock musicians to recreate the band's energetic early performances, it never makes Sutcliffe's story seem more than a footnote to musical history. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

In this bitter drama that takes place in the immediate aftermath of World War II, British Major Giles Burnside (David Niven) is assigned to a Austrian refugee camp, his orders to send the masses of displaced civilians to either the Russian or the American zone. Burnside is a by-the-books commander but has trouble making himself understood in the gaggle of different languages. But one of the refugees, Janovic, (Topol), is energetic and can speak many languages and Burnside hires him as his interpreter. Janovic quickly conveys Burnsides's directives and gets the way station running efficiently. Janovic even has time to romance a lovely innkeeper, Maria (Anna Karina). But Janovic's love for Maria hits a brick wall when he finds that she is carrying on an illicit affair with Burnside. As the remaining refugees are being dispatched to the different zones of occupation, Janovic is found to be a Russian deserter who must be returned to the Russian mainland to be executed. Burnside offers to help him escape, but Janovic can't decide whether to trust Burnside or not. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

This film brings more ribald nonsense from the British "Carry On" gang. This time the setting is the Spanish resort town of Elsbels. A group of stereotypical British tourists - led by courier Stuart Farquhar (Kenneth Williams) show up for a four-day weekend at a "luxury hotel." There are only two setbacks: the hotel doesn't seem to be finished yet...and it's raining through the roof. Oh, yes...all the staff members look suspiciously like the same person. Stalwart "Carry On" troupers Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Joan Sims, Kenneth Connor and Hattie Jacques are in attendance, while the toothsome Barbara Windsor shows up as "Miss Sadie Tompkins". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This bawdy entry in the long-running series of British "Carry On" comedies is set in the court of King Henry the VIII and centers on the gang's attempt to freshen up the odiferous Queen Marie and thereby save her head. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The inimitable Vincent Price puts an interesting spin on this otherwise pedestrian witch-hunt exercise -- a rehashing of Witchfinder General (aka The Conqueror Worm) and several of Roger Corman's numerous Poe variations from the previous decade. Here Price plays Edward Whitman, a corrupt, sadistic magistrate in 16th-century Ireland who puts a quick and deadly stop to the activities of a local Druidic coven... but not before the sect's leader Oona (Elisabeth Bergner) puts a curse on him and the Whitman family line, calling up a vengeful spirit known as a "sidhee" which takes flesh in the form of an otherwise mild-mannered stable boy (Patrick Mower). As swift and violent retribution works its way through the Whitman family, so does this film snowball toward its bizarre and muddled conclusion -- made all the more confounding by rather choppy editing. Just like Conqueror Worm and half a dozen others, this was fallaciously marketed by distributor American International Pictures as yet another adaptation of the works of Edgar Allan Poe -- as if AIP hadn't kicked Poe's corpse around enough in the '60s. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

The TARDIS crew visits the earth colony on a faraway planet. At first, the colony appears to be a paradise, but the Doctor (Patrick Troughton) cannot help but notice that there is a rebel movement against the ruling class. He will soon learn the reason for this unrest, but not until this four-part adventure has reached the halfway mark. Written by Ian Stuart Black, the first episode of the four-part "The Macra Terror was first aired on March 11, 1967. Though none of the episodes are known to exist, Doctor Who aficionados have determined that this particular story arc introduced a new opening title sequence to the series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the third episode of the four-part story "The Macra Terror," the Doctor (Patrick Troughton), Polly (Annika Wills), and Jamie (Frazer Hines) are forced to work in the Macra salt mines. Here, the time travelers make a horrifying discovery: The crablike Macra intend to use a colony of earthlings as the main ingredient for a gas that is vital to the planet's survival. Written by Ian Stuart Black, "The Macra Terror, Episode 3" first aired on March 25, 1967. This episode apparently no longer exists. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the second episode of the four-part story "The Romans," the Doctor (William Hartnell) and his companions encounter great danger while on a pleasure excursion to ancient Rome. Ian (William Russell) is captured and sold as a galley slave, while Barbara (Jacqueline Hill) is auctioned off as a "companion." The only hope for their rescue lies in the Doctor's precarious relationship with the Emperor Nero (Derek Francis). Originally telecast on January 23, 1965, "All Roads Lead to Rome" was written by Dennis Spooner. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Though not advertised as such, Follow That Camel was an entry in Britain's long-running "Carry On" series. Phil Silvers stars as Sgt. Nocker, a self-styled hero of the Foreign Legion. Nocker's feet of clay are readily apparent to young recruit Bertram Oliphant West (Jim Dale), but "orders is orders." When the Arabs attack, however, Nocker saves the day with some clever conniving. The "Carry On" team seems to be working at half-throttle here, perhaps in deference to the indefatigable Phil Silvers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This (13th) time around, "007" receives the usual call to come and visit "Mother" when another agent drops off a fake Faberge jeweled egg at the British embassy in East Berlin and is later killed at a traveling circus. Suspicions mount when the assistant manager of the circus Kamal (Louis Jourdan), outbids Bond for the real Faberge piece at Sotheby's. Bond follows Kamal to India where the superspy thwarts many an ingenious attack and encounters the antiheroine of the title (Maud Adams), an international smuggler who runs the circus as a cover for her illegal operations. It does not take long to figure out that Orlov (Steven Berkoff), a decidedly rank Russian general is planning to raise enough money with the fake Faberges to detonate a nuclear bomb in Europe and then defeat NATO forces once and for all in conventional warfare. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Also titled The Price of Freedom, Operation Daybreak is a retelling of the terrible consequences attending the assassination of Nazi-occupation leader Richard Heydrich. When Heydrich puts all of Czechoslovakia under his thumb, a group of Czech expatriates parachute into their homeland to kill the man known as "The Hangman." They succeed, and in retaliation the Nazis wipe the tiny Czech village of Lidice off the map, killing its male residents and carting off its women and children to concentration camps. For the purposes of the plot, assassins Timothy Bottoms and Martin Shaw survive the massacre, albeit only briefly. The Heydrich/Lidice tragedy was previously dramatized in two wartime films, Hangmen Also Die (1943) and Hitler's Madman (1943). Operation Daybreak was adapted from Seven Men at Daybreak, a novel by Alan Burgess. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

John LeCarre's Call for the Dead was the basis for this gloomy, complex spy story. James Mason plays a British secret agent puzzled by the sudden suicide of Foreign Office higher-up Robert Flemyng. Mason had worked on Flemyng's security clearance himself, and can't fathom what personality quirk he might have missed. The agent suspects that the dead man's wife (Simone Signoret), a concentration camp survivor, may hold the answer to Flemyng's despair, but the Foreign Office wants Mason to drop the case. Mason hires retiring Inspector Harry Andrews to do some private detective work. What Mason and Andrews find out is more insidious than they've imagined; worse, Mason is saddled with a new dilemma--his wife (Harriet Andersson) has been unfaithful with a colleague (Maximillian Schell). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide