David Warner Movies
Manchester native David Warner supported himself as a book salesman while studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts. Warner made his stage bow at the Royal Court Theater in 1962, the same year that he first appeared on television. In 1965, Warner became the youngest-ever member of the Royal Shakespeare Company to tackle the role of Hamlet. In films from 1963 (he played Master Blifil in Tom Jones), Warner achieved international fame for his star turn as the certifiably insane protagonist of Morgan! (1966). His appearance as the village idiot in Straw Dogs (1971) went uncredited due to an injury that rendered him uninsurable on the set; but this was the only time that Warner's contribution to a film would ever go unofficially unheralded. Seldom settling for a normal, sedate characterization, Warner has been seen as Jack the Ripper in Time After Time (1981), the Evil Genius in Time Bandits (1983), Dr. Alfred Necessiter (who had some interior decorator!) in The Man With Two Brains (1984), and genially eccentric Professor Jordan Perry (a good guy, for a change) in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2 (1992). He has also played two different roles in two consecutive Star Trek films. On television, David Warner has played Heydrich in Holocaust (1978), Pomponius Falco (a performance that won him an Emmy) in Masada (1981), and Bob Cratchit (what-not Scrooge?) in the 1984 adaptation of A Christmas Carol. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide- 1973
- G
This Joseph Losey-directed 1973 version of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House marks one of two cinematizations of the story released during the same year. Here, Jane Fonda plays Nora Helmer, the mousy Norwegian wife who eventually turns on her insensitive husband Torvald (David Warner). At the time of its release, A Doll's House was castigated for allowing Ms. Fonda to espouse her "feminist dogma" in the role. In truth, what Losey and Fonda give us is not the traditional mindless "hothouse rose" who finally comes to her senses in Act Three, but instead a woman who knows she is trapped in a stereotype, but is willing to play along as long as her husband loves and trusts her. Only when Torvald proves to be a thick-headed jerk by condescendingly forgiving his wife for entering into a potentially scandalous but household-saving financial arrangement, does Nora reject his values and slam the door on him. Trevor Howard plays the slimy Dr. Rank, who assumes that his monetary hold over Nora grants him certain intimate privileges. A Doll's House was exquisitely photographed on location in Norway by Gerry Fisher. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jane Fonda, David Warner, (more)
- 1973
- PG
The multipart From Beyond the Grave features Peter Cushing as the owner of a sinister antique shop. Utilizing the various artifacts in his establishment, Cushing metes out retribution to customers who try to bamboozle him. The quartet of horror playlets included herein are "The Gate Crasher," "An Act of Kindness," "The Elemental," and "The Door"; all originally appeared in short-story form in Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes' The Unbidden. The British cast includes David Warner, Donald Pleasence, Ian Bannen, Diana Dors, Nyree Dawn Porter, Ian Carmichael, Ian Ogilvy, Lesley-Anne Down, and Margaret Leighton. This Amicus production was also released as Creatures and The Creatures from Beyond the Grave. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Sam Peckinpah examines the instinctual capacity for violence in his controversial 1971 film, loosely based on the novel The Siege of Trencher's Farm. To avoid the Vietnam-era social chaos in the U.S., American mathematician David Sumner (Dustin Hoffman) moves with his British wife, Amy (Susan George), to the isolated Cornish town where she grew up, but their presence provokes antagonism among the village's men. As the hostilities escalate from routine bullying to the gang rape of his wife, David finds his pacifistic self backed into a corner. When the hooligans attack his house, David finally resorts to the gruesome violence that he abhors. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dustin Hoffman, Susan George, (more)
- 1970
- R
A trio of aspiring crooks plan to steal a million dollars in this crime comedy. Lord Nicholas (David Warner) and his Swiss wife Britt (Ursula Andress) are the jet-set couple who have spent all their money and seek a loan from the bank. She asks Graham (Stanley Baker) for a loan, but the mid-level manager has plans of his own to pad his retirement account by means of larceny. Graham approaches both Nicholas and Britt to help him in his plan. Britt sleeps with both men, willing to take off to Rio with the first one who gets his hands on the money. Nicholas and Graham both are under the assumption they are the masterminds of the plot that is highlighted by amusing twists. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ursula Andress, David Warner, (more)
After the intense bloodshed of The Wild Bunch (1969), this comic western fable took the opposite approach to director Sam Peckinpah's continuing examination of the end of the West. Left for dead by a couple of lizard-slaughtering desperados in the middle of the desert, prospector Cable Hogue (Jason Robards) is saved by his unexpected discovery of water "where there wasn't any." Hogue turns the water hole, felicitously located near a stagecoach route, into a thriving business, creating a rest stop for a never-ending series of parched travelers. On his occasional trips to the closest town, he meets chipper prostitute Hildy (Stella Stevens), who joins him in his oasis, completing Hogue's little paradise. But even though Hogue may be able to succeed and avenge himself against his original attackers, there is one thing that he cannot stop: progress. Completed before The Wild Bunch was released, and replete with comical and even musical interludes, Peckinpah's gently picaresque telling of Hogue's rise and fall stands in distinct contrast to the visual violence of its predecessor. The underlying message about the cost of modernity, however, equals The Wild Bunch in seriousness. The callous randomness of Hogue's fate is as shocking as the Bunch's final blaze of glory; as in Robert Altman's McCabe and Mrs. Miller from the same period, a tool of "civilization" provokes a most uncivilized end for an Old West dreamer. Although the film was as light-hearted in approach as the 1969 smash hit revisionist western Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Warner Bros. mishandled the release and it did barely any business; Peckinpah returned to his trademark gore in his next film, the controversial Straw Dogs (1971). Still, The Ballad of Cable Hogue is less an anomaly for a master of violence than an ironically charming chapter in Peckinpah's career-long elegy to the western. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jason Robards, Jr., Stella Stevens, (more)
- 1969
- PG
Michael (David Warner) is an independent businessman and a happily married man with two children. Traveling to the market one day, he is victimized by a nobleman who demands compensation for crossing his land. Michael leaves two horses and a caretaker on the noble's land after he has paid for passage. He returns for the horses when he discovers that the landowner has no legal right to demand the compensation. Michael discovers his caretaker has been beaten and the horses are near death. A court rules he must take back the horses in their pitiful condition, and he refuses to accept the verdict. His wife Elisabeth (Anna Karina) is killed by a stampede, pushing Michael over the edge. He succumbs to a life of crime, when he torches the nobleman's castle, but the evil count escapes. Michael becomes a hero as people join the cause in rebelling against the unpopular judgment, but he really only wishes to take back his horses and have the nobleman held accountable for his actions. He tracks the nobleman to another town and his rebel army kills the soldiers protecting the cowardly count. A rapist is hung for his crimes, and Michael agrees to turn himself in when officials promise his case will be heard again in this brutal tale of political crimes and reprisals of the common man. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Warner, Anna Karina, (more)
- 1968
John Frankenheimer directed this intense film adaptation of the Bernard Malamud novel. During the days of Czarist Russia, a poor but educated Jew, Yakov Bok (Alan Bates) is abandoned by his wife Raisl (Carol White). Yakov decides to leave his small village and travel to Kiev. Since it is the time of the pogroms, Yakov poses as a gentile and takes a job as a handyman for Lebedev (Hugh Griffith), a drunken anti-Semitic merchant. Yakov rises up the ladder in Lebedev's establishment, and he is eventually promoted to factory overseer-accountant. But when a neighborhood boy is murdered, Yakov's true identity is discovered. Yakov is unjustly accused of the murder and arrested. Bibikov (Dirk Bogarde), a government attorney, believes Yakov to be innocent and attempts to discover the true killer -- realizing that if a confession is forced out of Yakov, the entire Jewish population could be in dire trouble. Bravely, Yakov puts up with the brutal prison life, refusing to confess, hoping Bibikov may discover some new evidence to re-open his case. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Alan Bates, Dirk Bogarde, (more)
- 1968
John McGrath's television play The Bofors Gun was expanded (if not improved) by this film adaptation. The time is 1954: a weak-willed British corporal (David Warner) desperately wants to improve his lot in the National Service by taking the officer's entrance course. A rebellious, sociopathic Irish private (Nicol Williamson) takes a dislike to the corporal. He hopes to humiliate the would-be officer and to this end commits suicide while the corporal is guarding him. The character motivations in The Bofors Gun might be lost on anyone who lacks intimate knowledge of the turbulent Irish/British relationships of the era, but the characters themselves are easily recognizable types. One problem: Who is there to root for in this squalid tale? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nicol Williamson, Ian Holm, (more)
- 1968
Set in a futuristic world where man and machines compete, this comical fantasy centers upon a rather eccentric man who prefers raising his special giant, euphoria-producing mushrooms to working and spending time with his fiancee. He means well, for he believes that his funny fungus will help combat the increasing dehumanization of society. However, unable to withstand his bride's pressure, he finally takes a real job in a power plant. There he knocks out the power and then feeds his mushrooms to the authorities. While they walk around in a hallucinatory daze, he and his fiancee take a baby carriage filled with mushrooms and hightail it out of town. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Warner, Cilla Black, (more)
British director Peter Hall's 1968 filmization of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, starring the Royal Shakespeare Company, is faithful to the text and to the main plot, which involves the "bewitching" of several groups of mortals by a covey of mischievous invisible fairies. So why did critics complain? Hall's handling of Shakespeare's prose and iambic pentameter didn't bother the purists as much as the director's visual choices. Hall was criticized for staging the film in a typically rainy British winter rather than the mid-Summer alluded to in the play's title. The director responded by pointing out that the fairies, led by Oberon and Titania, were deliberately toying with the expectations and sensibilities of the Mortals -- thus, it made sense to confuse the "human" characters by playing havoc with the weather. Other stylistic alterations included updating the story to the 19th century, and the near-nudity of Judi Dench as Titania. Most of the film is shot in close-up (most effectively during the soliloquies of Diana Rigg, as Helena), not so much to hide budgetary deficiencies as to play better on television. Also featuring Ian Holm (as Puck) Barbara Jefford, Helen Mirren, Michael Jayston, Paul Rogers, Ian Richardson and David Warner, this Midsummer Night's Dream premiered in the U.S. on the CBS TV network on Sunday evening, February 9, 1969. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Derek Godfrey, Barbara Jefford, (more)
- 1968
This is one of several film versions of the classic play by Anton Chekhov. The depressing tale of unrequited love begins when an aging actress Arkadina (Simone Signoret) and her arrogant writer companion Trigorin (James Mason) travel to a small Russian town to visit her brother, an ailing public official in retirement. Nina (Vanessa Redgrave) is the neighbor girl who falls for Trigorin. The simple country girl is degraded by the older, more worldly author as she follows him to the big city and falls victim to the debauchery of urban life. Arkadina also deals with a hateful son who is driven to suicide in this somber and depressing film. Although there are some moments of comedy in the play, this film version is decidedly more downbeat. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- James Mason, Vanessa Redgrave, (more)
- 1967
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
- Starring:
- James Mason, Simone Signoret, (more)
A classic 1960's cult film in the British "angry young man" tradition, the hero of this film from Czech director Karel Reisz is more lunatic than agitator. Morgan Delt (David Warner) is an artist from a working class background, married to Leonie (Vanessa Redgrave), a woman far above him in social standing. Given to a rich fantasy life to begin with, Morgan goes off the mental deep end when Leonie informs him that she's asking for a divorce and taking up with art dealer Robert Stephens (Charles Napier), a man more befitting her class. Thoroughly gone around the bend, Morgan enacts a series of bizarre gags and stunts in a campaign to win Leonie back, including putting a skeleton in her bed and crashing her wedding dressed as a gorilla. His antics eventually get Morgan arrested and committed to an asylum, where he embraces his mother's ardent communist beliefs. Redgrave was Oscar nominated for Best Actress for her role, her feature film debut. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Vanessa Redgrave, David Warner, (more)
- 1965
Orson Welles narrates this informative documentary on the life of The Duke of Windsor. With newsreel footage and films from the former king's private collection, the Duke and Duchess (the former Mrs. Wallace Simpson) are interviewed and give candid recollections of the classic story of the man who gave up the royal crown for the woman he loved. The Duchess is not even mentioned in the first 70 minutes of the feature, with the focus being on the scholastic and military training of the young man who would become King Edward VIII. Careful attention was given in portraying the Duke as a right good chap with no mention of his admiration for Adolph Hitler. The Duke was in his 70s at the time of the documentary and reads from his original abdication speech given after only 325 days on the throne. An added bonus are interior scenes of Buckingham Palace and other royal retreats. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- 1964
Originally staged in 1963, War of the Roses was one of the most controversial and ambitious projects ever undertaken by Britain's Royal Shakespeare Company. Flying in the face of adverse criticism from the more conservative theatrical scholars, John Burton and Peter Hall condensed the Bard's Henry VI trilogy and Richard III into a mere three plays, cutting nearly half the text and adding newly-minted Shakespearean iambic pentameter to cover the gaps. Prominent in the cast were such notables as Peggy Ashcroft, David Warner, and Ian Holm. When War of the Roses was presented as an 11-part TV series by the BBC beginning April 8, 1965, Warner repeated his celebrated performance as Henry VI, while Paul Martin replaced Ian Holm as the scheming Richard III. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Warner, Roy Dotrice, (more)
Tony Richardson's adaptation of Henry Fielding's classic novel was one of the most critically acclaimed and popular comedies of its time, winning four Academy Awards, including Best Picture. The film follows Tom Jones (Albert Finney), a country boy who becomes one of the wildest playboys in 18th century England, developing a ravenous taste for women, food, and rowdy adventures. Over the course of the film, Jones tries to amass his own fortune and win the heart of Sophie (Susannah York). Not only does John Osborne's Oscar-winning screenplay stay true to the tone of the novel, but the cast -- including Lynn Redgrave in her first screen role -- tears into the story with spirited abandon, making the movie a wildly entertaining and witty experience. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Albert Finney, Susannah York, (more)
