Patrick Malahide Movies
Born Patrick G. Duggan on March 24, 1945, Patrick Malahide grew up in the Thames Valley west of London in the village of Pangbourne, where Kenneth Grahame wrote about Mole, Toad, and Rat in the 1908 children's classic The Wind in the Willows. Malahide's Irish immigrant parents each held down two jobs to send Patrick and their other two children to the best schools. Patrick attended St. Anne's Primary and then the Douai School of the Benedictine Abbey at Upper Woolhampton, Berkshire. At both schools, Patrick received an excellent education and learned to mix with upper-class children and mimic the articulation and cadence of their speech. Thus, he was unwittingly preparing himself for film roles requiring an understanding of class-conscious societies and a mastery of accents. Such roles included his portrayal of Sir John Conroy in the 2001 TV miniseries Victoria and Albert, Captain Claude Howlett in the 1999 TV miniseries All the King's Men, and the Rev. Casaubon in the 1994 TV miniseries Middlemarch. After attending Edinburgh University, where he studied literature and psychology and performed with a dramatic society, he taught English at a boys' school in Wokingham. Soon, however, he abandoned the classroom for the stage, managing and directing at a small theater and acting in the plays of Henrik Ibsen, Noel Coward, Anton Chekhov, and Arthur Miller. After performing in London, he signed on with the Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh, playing roles in the dramas of Shakespeare and other classic authors, accepted television roles, and earned critical acclaim in 1981 in a tour de force one-man show, Judgement [writer's note: the British spelling of the word "judgment" is correct here], in which he tells the audience why he resorted to cannibalism to survive as a Russian officer in a Nazi prison. Then came worldwide recognition from productions such as The Killing Fields (1984), the TV miniseries The Singing Detective (1985), A Month in the Country (1987), the TV docudrama Investigation: Inside a Terrorist Bombing (1990), A Man of No Importance (1994), U.S. Marshals (1998), and Billy Elliot (2000). ~ Mike Cummings, All Movie Guide
This 19th century period drama set in Northern Ireland tells the story of Sarah (Saskia Reeves), a young woman born into poor circumstances in a devoutly Presbyterian family. Sarah and her mother Martha (Brenda Bruce) are hired to work as housekeepers by a widowed farmer, Mr. Echlin (Geoffrey Golden), who raises potatoes and sheep with his two sons, Frank (Ciaran Hinds) and Hamilton (Donal McCann). When Mr. Echlin dies in a boating accident, Martha leaves the farm and returns to her cottage, but Sarah stays behind, opting to work for Frank and Hamilton on her own terms, and takes both brothers as lovers. In time, Sarah becomes pregnant, but, despite the local scandal, she refuses to name the father and opts to raise the child on her own so that her family name will live on. Director Thaddeus O'Sullivan won the Silver Rosa Camuna Award at the 1990 Bergamo (Italy) Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Donal McCann, Saskia Reeves, (more)
John Madden's sweeping drama After the War tells the tale of a quarter-century relationship between two men who share a similar wartime experience and a similar religious background. Michael Jordan grew up in a well-heeled British family, while Joe Hirsch spent much of his childhood on the run from the Nazis. The two become friends when they are both enrolled at the same school in 1942. They survive anti-Semitic taunts together. Joe grows into a powerful media figure, while Michael becomes a respected man of the arts. The film charts a quarter-century of their history together, detailing a relationship that is equally affectionate and hostile. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Susannah York, Denis Quilley, (more)
- 1987
- PG
Pat O'Connor directs this tranquil version of the J. L. Carr novel, adapted for the screen by Simon Gray. The film concerns two emotionally scarred men recovering from the horrors of World War I during an idyllic summer in the English countryside. It is 1919, and war veteran Tom Birkin (Colin Firth) travels to the small English village of Oxgodly to restore a medieval church mural that is hidden under coats of plaster. At the same time, another war veteran, archaeologist John Moon (Kenneth Branagh) is exploring the nearby fields trying to uncover an ancient church grave. As they toil away in this placid environment, their emotional war wounds are gradually healed, and they come to terms with their problems. Birkin finds himself falling in love with Alice Keach (Natasha Richardson), the wife of the local vicar, while Moon finds himself learning to deal with his homosexuality. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Colin Firth, Kenneth Branagh, (more)
- 1986
With the notable exception of Pennies From Heaven, The Singing Detective was the best-known TV miniseries project of the iconoclastic, darkly humored Dennis Potter. A reworking of Potter's first novel Hide and Seek, the six-part series starred Michael Gambon as crime novelist Philip E. Marlow. Suffering from a hellish skin-and-nerve disease called psoriatic arthroparthy (a painful infliction which ultimately killed the real-life Potter), Marlow was confined to a hospital bed, where under the influence of numerous prescription drugs he began to imagine himself as the hard-boiled hero of his latest detective novel. While trying to solve a difficult case, Marlow continually drifted backward in time to his childhood in the Forest of Dean, occasionally bursting into song to express his emotions. As fantasy and reality merged into one, Marlow was forced into a tortuous session of self-analysis and personal discovery. Virtually everyone in the cast was seen in double and triple roles, including nominal leading ladies Alison Steadman and Joanne Whalley (aka Joanne Whalley-Kilmer). The series earned two BAFTA awards (the British equivalent of the Emmys), one for Best Actor to Michael Gambon. After its initial BBC1 run from November 16, to December 21, 1986, The Singing Detective was shown in the United States via public and cable television, where it picked up another award, the prestigious Peabody, in 1989. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Gambon, Patrick Malahide, (more)
- 1984
- PG
Writer/director Bill Forsyth's follow-up to his best film, Local Hero, is another comic exploration of a man undergoing a personal crisis. In Local Hero, the American played by Peter Riegert finds himself enchanted by the people and ambience of a Scottish village he has been dispatched to purchase for an oil company. In Comfort and Joy, Alan (Bill Paterson) is a Glasgow radio disc jockey whose air name is the chirpy Dickey Bird. After Maddy, his girlfriend (Eleanor David), walks out on him at Christmas, he's spurred to re-evaluate his life. Looking for more meaningful work than spinning pop tunes and offering inane chatter to his geriatric listeners, Alan decides to make a radio documentary. He chances upon a local rivalry between two ice cream companies, who are sabotaging each other's trucks in an effort to monopolize the market. Attracted to Charlotte (C.P. Grogan), the daughter of one of the company owners, Alan finds himself playing peacemaker rather than documentarian. That this cold war takes place in the dead of a bitter Scottish winter is only one of Forsyth's many sly touches. ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bill Paterson, Eleanor David, (more)
The Killing Fields is a romanticized adaptation of an eyewitness magazine story by New York Times correspondent Sidney Schanberg. Covering the U.S. pullout from Vietnam in 1975, Schanberg (Sam Waterston) relies on his Cambodian friend and translator Dith Pran (Haing S. Ngor) for inside information. Schanberg has an opportunity to rescue Dith Pran when the U.S. army evacuates all Cambodian citizens; instead, the reporter coerces his friend to remain behind to continue sending him news flashes. Although his family is helicoptered out of Saigon (a recreation of the famous TV news clip), Dith Pran stays with Schanberg on the ground. Racked with guilt, Schanberg does his best to arrange for Dith Pran's escape, but the Cambodian is captured by the dreaded Khmer Rouge. Accepting his Pulitzer Prize on behalf of Dith Pran, Schanberg vows to do right by his friend and extricate him from Cambodia. The rest of the film details Dith Pran's harrowing experiences at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, and his attempt to escape on his own. The Killing Fields won Academy Awards for Hang S. Ngor (a Cambodian doctor who lived through many of the horrific events depicted herein), cinematographer Chris Menges, and editor Jim Clark; an Oscar nomination went to Roland Joffe, who made his directorial debut with this film. Spalding Gray, who played a small role in the film, later elaborated on this experiences in his one-man stage presentation Swimming to Cambodia. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sam Waterston, Dr. Haing S. Ngor, (more)
- 1983
The inaugural season of the British satirical comedy series The Black Adder ended on July 20, 1983, with the episode titled "The Black Seal." Having exhausted all efforts to usurp the throne of England, Edmund (Rowan Atkinson) resorts to drastic measures -- which, characteristically, are really drastic. Planning to seize the throne by force, Edmund enlists the aid of the Seven Most Evil Men in the land -- among them such worthies as Three-Fingered Pete (Roger Slomon), Sir Wilfred Death (John Hallam), and Mad Gerald (played by "himself," though he bears a marked resemblance to character comedian Rik Mayall). After "The Black Seal," The Black Adder would go on a lengthy hiatus, not to be seen again until 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rowan Atkinson, Tony Robinson, (more)
- 1977
The New Avengers wrapped up its first season with an episode which writer Dennis Spooner has confessed was based on "Attack of the Alligators",an installment of the "Supermarionation" series Thunderbirds (with, it would seem, a bit of "Monty Python" thrown in). An illicitly developed growth liquid seeps into the London sewer system, creating a giant, deadly rat. Kidnapped by the scientists who created the liquid, Purdey (Joanna Lumley) is set up as bait for the king-sized vermin--and our girl must also contend with a passel of killer tomatoes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Patrick Macnee, Gareth Hunt, (more)
