James Mason

  • Norman Cohen – The London Nobody Knows (1968)

    1961-1970ArchitectureDocumentaryNorman CohenUnited Kingdom

    Quote:
    In stark contrast to the colourful, “swinging” imagery of 1960’s London we are all too familiar with, The London Nobody Knows, displays the dying, decaying underbelly of old Victorian values, practices and architecture. We are shown proto-delboy’s hawking goods in now-dead street markets. Bizarre buskers and street performers act out their defunct acts to grey, bewildered onlookers. Old forgotten men pay 6 shillings a week for bed and breakfast in Salvation Army hostels, the memories of the war lingering in their haggard faces.Read More »

  • Warren Beatty & Buck Henry – Heaven Can Wait (1978)

    1971-1980Buck HenryComedyFantasyFilm BlancUSAWarren Beatty

    A Los Angeles Rams quarterback, accidentally taken away from his body by an overanxious angel before he was meant to die, returns to life in the body of a recently murdered millionaire.Read More »

  • Leslie Arliss – The Man in Grey (1943)

    Leslie Arliss1941-1950ClassicsDramaUSA
    The Man in Grey (1943)
    The Man in Grey (1943)

    Synopsis:
    At an estate auction in WWII England, two strangers meet and muse about their families’ history and possible connections. Flashbacks reveal the story of the sweet, rich, and beautiful Clarissa Richmond and her friendship with bitter, impoverished Hesther Shaw. Their fates are intertwined even as their paths diverge. Clarissa marries the handsome but cruel Marquis of Rohan while Hesther becomes an actress. Eventually, the two women meet again and Clarissa brings the scheming Hesther into her household. As Clarissa searches for true love, Hesther plots to take away everything that belongs to her.Read More »

  • Franklin J. Schaffner – The Boys from Brazil (1978)

    1971-1980Franklin J. SchaffnerSci-FiThrillerUnited Kingdom
    The Boys from Brazil (1978)
    The Boys from Brazil (1978)

    Barry Kohler, a young Nazi hunter, tracks down a group of former SS officers meeting in Paraguay in the late 1970s. The Nazis, led by Dr Mengele, are planning something. Old Nazi hunter, Ezra Lieberman, is at first uninterested in Kohler’s findings. But when he is told something of their plan, he is eageRead More »

  • Hugo Fregonese – One Way Street (1950)

    1941-1950CrimeFilm NoirHugo FregoneseUSA

    PLOT: After stealing a gangster’s money and his girlfriend, a doctor heads for a small village in Mexico to hide out.Read More »

  • Sam Peckinpah – Cross of Iron (1977)

    1971-1980DramaSam PeckinpahUnited KingdomWar

    Quote:
    A quote from Bertolt Brecht ends this bitter and angry war film by Sam Peckinpah: “Do not rejoice in his defeat, you men. For though the world has stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again.” Peckinpah’s intense and belligerently non-commercial work, (based on the book by Willi Heinrich), is a World War II tale told from the German perspective, following a platoon of German soldiers in the Russia of 1943, when the German Wehrmacht forces had been decimated and the Germans were retreating along the Russian front. James Coburn is Steiner, a German corporal and recipient of the Iron Cross who feels that he owes his loyalty to his family and fellow soldiers and not to Hitler and the German war machine. But when a new commander, Captain Stransky (Maximillian Schell), takes over the platoon, Steiner and Stransky come into immediate conflict. Stransky is a career soldier, the complete opposite of Steiner, and a man who pledges himself heart and soul to Hitler and the war. But he envies Steiner for having been awarded an Iron Cross and deeply desires one himself. The problem is Stransky is a complete coward and recognizes that the only way he can be awarded an Iron Cross would be to get the bitter Steiner on his side.Read More »

  • James Ivory – Autobiography of a Princess (1975)

    1971-1980DramaJames IvoryUnited Kingdom

    On the anniversary of her father’s death, an Indian princess (Madhur Jaffrey) celebrates his memory in her London apartment by having tea and showing a selection of home movies to her guest, her father’s old tutor Cyril Sahib (James Mason). The princess would like him to write a book about her father and the rich, colourful lifestyle of royal privilege that has now all but disappeared and is likely to be soon forgotten if it is not recorded for posterity.Read More »

  • Joseph L. Mankiewicz – 5 Fingers (1952)

    Joseph L. Mankiewicz1951-1960ThrillerUSA

    During WWII the valet to the British Ambassador to Ankara sells British secrets to the Germans while trying to romance a refugee Polish countess.Read More »

  • Joseph L. Mankiewicz – Julius Caesar (1953)

    Joseph L. Mankiewicz1951-1960ClassicsPoliticsUSAWilliam Shakespeare

    Synopsis:
    Brutus is convinced by a scheming band of Roman senators, led by Caius Cassius, that his dear friend Julius Caesar intends to dissolve the republic and install himself as monarch, and he joins a conspiracy to assassinate him. Brutus stirringly defends his actions, but when Mark Antony responds with a speech that plays upon the crowd’s love for their fallen leader, a battle between the two factions is assured.Read More »

Back to top button