Patrick Allen

  • Tony Palmer – Omnibus: Benjamin Britten and His Festival (1967)

    Documentary1961-1970Tony PalmerUnited Kingdom

    Tony Palmer’s classic behind the scenes look at the Aldeburgh Festival and the opening by the Queen of the new concert hall at Snape.

    This was the first film made by the BBC ever to be networked in the USA, and the first of Tony Palmer’s three portraits of the great composer, the others being the Italia Prize-winning ‘A Time There Was’, and the multi-award winning ‘Nocturne’, made for the 100th anniversary of Britten’s birth.

    “A superb film (which) may well achieve the status of a classic, repeated again and again over the years… the brilliant editing (was) of the highest quality, making a natural partnership of music and picture.” – Sean Day-Lewis, The Daily TelegraphRead More »

  • Cyril Frankel – Never Take Sweets from a Stranger (1960)

    1951-1960Cyril FrankelDramaHammer FilmsThrillerUnited Kingdom

    Peter Carter, his wife Sally and their young daughter Jean move to a sleepy Canadian village, where Peter has been hired as a school principal. Their idyll is shattered when it’s discovered that Jean has been the victim of the pedophile patriarch of the town’s most powerful family, and their cries for help are met with resistance from their new friends and neighbours.Read More »

  • Peter Graham Scott – Captain Clegg AKA Night Creatures (1962)

    1961-1970AdventureHammer FilmsHorrorPeter Graham ScottUnited Kingdom

    Synopsis:
    In this engaging costume melodrama of skulduggery on the low seas set back in the 18th-century, the Royal Crown suspects a bit of smuggling is going on in this locale, and they send Captain Collier (Patrick Allen) and his crew to check it out. As the Captain gets into his investigation, mysterious swamp phantoms cloud up the real issue which seems plain enough to see. Captain Collier suspects that the odd village vicar (Peter Cushing) might be hiding something, and what better way to do that than by fortuitous ghosts to scare away the curious, or by posing as someone he is not?Read More »

  • Ken Hughes – The Long Haul (1957)

    Drama1951-1960CrimeKen HughesUnited Kingdom

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    synopsis
    One of several British melodramas picked up for American distribution by Columbia in the late 1950s, The Long Haul stars Victor Mature and Diana Dors, two of the prettiest and most amply endowned screen personalities of the era. Mature is cast as American ex-GI Harry Miller, who takes a job as a truck driver to support his British war bride Connie (Gene Anderson). It isn’t long, however, before Harry is blackmailed into joining a smuggling operation run by the conniving Casey (Liam Redmond). His resolved momentarily weakened by his obsession with gang moll Lynn (Diana Dors), Harry finally decides to turn honest again–if the other crooks will let him live that long. Director Ken Hughes adapted the screenplay from a novel by Mervyn Mills….by Hal EricksonRead More »

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