Paul Luty Movies

The complicated relationship of two men who have given their lives to the theater forms the basis for this acclaimed drama. During World War II, an aging but once famous Shakespearean actor, addressed by his cast and crew only as "Sir" (Albert Finney), continues to tour the British theater circuit with a rag tag group of elderly and handicapped actors who are exempt from military service. Sir has grown frustrated, senile, and is on the verge of a nervous breakdown; he's come to rely upon his dresser Norman (Tom Courtenay), an endlessly loyal homosexual who would do anything for the man he's come to love. Norman tries to guide Sir through yet another tour of the hinterlands in The Tempest. This expanded film adaptation of Ronald Harwood's award-winning stage drama also stars Edward Fox as Oxenby, an unhappy member of Sir's company; Sir was said to be based on real-life actor Donald Wolfit. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Lionel Jeffries directed Water Babies, a children's fantasy based on the story by Charles Kingsley that incorporates live-action and animation in the tradition of The Incredible Mr. Limpet. In Dickensian London, a 12-year-old chimney sweep's apprentice named Tom (Tommy Pender) has to put up with his boss, Grimes (James Mason), and his heavy drinking. One day, in the home of a client, Tom is accused of stealing the silverware. Tom makes a run for it and leaps into a pool, where he comes across a collection of animated characters. While submerged he helps to rescue "water babies," children held hostage by an eel and a shark. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Following his successful foray into swashbuckler comedy with The Three Musketeers and The Four Musketeers, director Richard Lester made what has proved to be one of the few quality films from the disaster craze that dominated filmmaking in the mid-'70s. Juggernaut is the pseudonym of a madman (Freddie Jones) who plants several steel drums aboard a luxury liner and calls the company's officials once the boat has put out to sea, demanding a large sum of money in exchange for instructions on how to defuse bombs inside the drums. Anthony Hopkins plays one of the company officials whose wife and children are aboard the ship, Omar Sharif is the ship's captain, Shirley Knight is a passenger who is also his mistress, and Richard Harris and David Hemmings are two members of the bomb disposal team, which is helicoptered onto the ship to defuse the explosives. As in many of Lester's best works, humor pops up in unexpected places; particularly memorable are Harris as the weary but wisecracking top dog among the explosives experts and Lester regular Roy Kinnear as a bumbling entertainment director desperately trying to distract the apprehensive passengers. ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide

Roger Corman's New World Pictures took a stab at the tale of the nefarious real-life graverobbers -- and filled it with the studio's usual quota of nudity, softcore sex and tacky humor. The result is pretty much as one would expect -- nothing to rival the excellent Flesh and the Fiends, or even Tod Slaughter's campy The Greed of William Hart. Harry Andrews plays the unscrupulous Dr. Knox, who enlists the aid of grave-plundering dirtbags Derren Nesbitt and Glynn Edwards in obtaining fresh cadavers for the medical academy. When the demand increases and local cemeteries begin to run dry, the industrious pair turn to the living to keep the doctor supplied. This time out, Burke and Hare are particularly randy fellows, who spend more time carousing in Edinburgh whorehouses than stalking their prey. Despite the macabre subject matter, the producers opted for sexploitation over gruesome horror, but the end result is decidedly dull. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide