One of the key works in the early British “kitchen sink” movement, John Schlesinger’s screen adaptation of Keith Waterhouse’s seriocomic novel spoke loudly to young people the world over. Tom Courtenay, taking over from Albert Finney in the stage version, made a big enough impression to go on to a strong career. But the revelation here is Julie Christie, luminous as the hero’s free-spirited girlfriend in only her third film role. Schlesinger went on direct her Oscar-winning breakthough two years later with the lead role in Darling.
The post Billy Liar appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
The post Billy Liar appeared first on Trailers From Hell.
- 2/8/2023
- by TFH Team
- Trailers from Hell
“The Ruler Of Ambrosia”
By Raymond Benson
Director John Schlesinger emerged from the so-called British New Wave, or “Free Cinema Movement,” of the late 1950s/early 60s, that was typified by pictures made by maverick filmmakers working with low budgets and concentrating on working-class heroes in often bleak settings of smaller towns around Britain.
Billy Liar, based on the novel by Keith Waterhouse and the stage play by Waterhouse and Willis Hall (with a screenplay by Waterhouse and Hall), was Schlesinger’s second film, and it is an exhilarating demonstration of the director’s confidence and talent. Schlesinger would go on to direct such classics as Darling (1965) and Midnight Cowboy (1969).
Filmed in widescreen black and white, the tale focuses on Billy Fisher a young man who still lives with his stodgy parents and a grandmother in a Yorkshire town. He juggles three girlfriends and a job at a mortuary that he hates,...
By Raymond Benson
Director John Schlesinger emerged from the so-called British New Wave, or “Free Cinema Movement,” of the late 1950s/early 60s, that was typified by pictures made by maverick filmmakers working with low budgets and concentrating on working-class heroes in often bleak settings of smaller towns around Britain.
Billy Liar, based on the novel by Keith Waterhouse and the stage play by Waterhouse and Willis Hall (with a screenplay by Waterhouse and Hall), was Schlesinger’s second film, and it is an exhilarating demonstration of the director’s confidence and talent. Schlesinger would go on to direct such classics as Darling (1965) and Midnight Cowboy (1969).
Filmed in widescreen black and white, the tale focuses on Billy Fisher a young man who still lives with his stodgy parents and a grandmother in a Yorkshire town. He juggles three girlfriends and a job at a mortuary that he hates,...
- 4/28/2020
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Do you ever lapse into daydream fantasies to escape from everyday life? Tom Courtenay and John Schlesinger changed their destinies and that of Julie Christie with this brilliant (black?) comedy about what ought to be a tragic situation. The frustrated Billy rebels against his dull routine with outrageous lies and chicanery, but hasn’t the courage to strike forth on his own — even when invited to do so by the girl of his dreams. Schlesinger’s delightful directorial style applies brash New Wave editing to Billy’s grandiose ‘Walter Mitty’ fantasies.
Billy Liar
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1963 / B&w / 2:35 widescreen / 98 min. / Street Date April 28, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Tom Courtenay, Julie Christie, Wilfred Pickles, Mona Washbourne, Ethel Griffies, Finlay Currie.
Cinematography: Denys N. Coop
Film Editor: Roger Cherrill
Original Music: Richard Rodney Bennett
Written by Keith Waterhouse, Willis Hall from their play
Produced by Joseph Janni
Directed by...
Billy Liar
Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1963 / B&w / 2:35 widescreen / 98 min. / Street Date April 28, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Tom Courtenay, Julie Christie, Wilfred Pickles, Mona Washbourne, Ethel Griffies, Finlay Currie.
Cinematography: Denys N. Coop
Film Editor: Roger Cherrill
Original Music: Richard Rodney Bennett
Written by Keith Waterhouse, Willis Hall from their play
Produced by Joseph Janni
Directed by...
- 4/21/2020
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Beanie Feldstein nails the Wolverhampton accent in this warm hearted and acid tongued tale of growing up into a gunslinging music journalist
Some pure Caitlin Moran gold is to be had in this very funny and sometimes inspiring coming-of-age comedy, adapted by the columnist and author Moran from her bestselling autobiographical novel from 2014 and directed by Coky Giedroyc. The story takes us to Moran’s now legendary upbringing in a Midlands council house with many siblings: the same scenario she sketched out in her excellent (and scandalously cancelled) Channel 4 TV sitcom Raised By Wolves — and rapidly becoming as mythical as Billy Liar’s home-life in Keith Waterhouse’s novel. It is all, as ever, treated with hilarious and utterly unsentimental wit and affection.
The American star Beanie Feldstein plays nerdy, friendless sixth-former and bibliophile Johanna Korrigan, and moreover does so with a pretty decent Wolverhampton accent — this isn’t like...
Some pure Caitlin Moran gold is to be had in this very funny and sometimes inspiring coming-of-age comedy, adapted by the columnist and author Moran from her bestselling autobiographical novel from 2014 and directed by Coky Giedroyc. The story takes us to Moran’s now legendary upbringing in a Midlands council house with many siblings: the same scenario she sketched out in her excellent (and scandalously cancelled) Channel 4 TV sitcom Raised By Wolves — and rapidly becoming as mythical as Billy Liar’s home-life in Keith Waterhouse’s novel. It is all, as ever, treated with hilarious and utterly unsentimental wit and affection.
The American star Beanie Feldstein plays nerdy, friendless sixth-former and bibliophile Johanna Korrigan, and moreover does so with a pretty decent Wolverhampton accent — this isn’t like...
- 9/15/2019
- by Peter Bradshaw in Toronto
- The Guardian - Film News
The 1963 arrival of Billy Liar looked like the beginnings of a more democratic, working-class film industry. So why are we still stuck with polite social realism and sniggery classism?
Billy Liar always was a great night out. “A brand new kind of escapist entertainment,” the trailer blared when the film was released in 1963. But the escape it most literally concerned – one in which a northern funeral clerk might jump on a train and make it as a London scriptwriter – wasn’t then so far fetched. Adapted from his own novel by Keith Waterhouse, it arrived in a Britain giddy on the Beatles and grammar school upstarts like Billy. Social mobility brought the film to life. While director John Schlesinger was solidly Hampstead, Waterhouse was a dropout from Osmondthorpe Council School, Leeds, and star Tom Courtenay the son of a Hull dockworker. As the box office boomed, a daydreamer might have...
Billy Liar always was a great night out. “A brand new kind of escapist entertainment,” the trailer blared when the film was released in 1963. But the escape it most literally concerned – one in which a northern funeral clerk might jump on a train and make it as a London scriptwriter – wasn’t then so far fetched. Adapted from his own novel by Keith Waterhouse, it arrived in a Britain giddy on the Beatles and grammar school upstarts like Billy. Social mobility brought the film to life. While director John Schlesinger was solidly Hampstead, Waterhouse was a dropout from Osmondthorpe Council School, Leeds, and star Tom Courtenay the son of a Hull dockworker. As the box office boomed, a daydreamer might have...
- 9/8/2018
- by Danny Leigh
- The Guardian - Film News
Close-Up is a feature that spotlights films now playing on Mubi. John Schlesinger's Billy Liar (1963) is playing July 16 - August 15, 2017 in the United States as part of the series John Schlesinger's First Masterpieces.Billy Fisher, a cheerful twenty-something lad from Yorkshire, is going to have a great future. For now, he only has a small office position in his dull small city, but Billy has already landed a job in London writing for a popular TV comedian. He is also working on a novel that soon enough will bring him fame and fortune. He is also engaged to a girl. Actually, two girls. And he doesn’t really want to marry any of them. Also, the TV star doesn’t really know that Billy exists. And he hasn’t started on the novel. Billy just has a vivid imagination and speaks before he thinks—some people prefer to call it compulsive lying.
- 7/24/2017
- MUBI
Ron Moody in Mel Brooks' 'The Twelve Chairs.' The 'Doctor Who' that never was. Ron Moody: 'Doctor Who' was biggest professional regret (See previous post: "Ron Moody: From Charles Dickens to Walt Disney – But No Harry Potter.") Ron Moody was featured in about 50 television productions, both in the U.K. and the U.S., from the late 1950s to 2012. These included guest roles in the series The Avengers, Gunsmoke, Starsky and Hutch, Hart to Hart, and Murder She Wrote, in addition to leads in the short-lived U.S. sitcom Nobody's Perfect (1980), starring Moody as a Scotland Yard detective transferred to the San Francisco Police Department, and in the British fantasy Into the Labyrinth (1981), with Moody as the noble sorcerer Rothgo. Throughout the decades, he could also be spotted in several TV movies, among them:[1] David Copperfield (1969). As Uriah Heep in this disappointing all-star showcase distributed theatrically in some countries.
- 6/19/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
The Wicker Man is being considered as a TV series, according to Red Production Company.
The company is keen to adapt feature films such as the 1973 horror movie for the small screen, after being acquired by Studio Canal last year.
The acquisition means that Red has access to the company's vast film library, including The Wicker Man and 1963 movie Billy Liar.
Red's managing director Andrew Critchley told Broadcast: "One of the films we're looking at is The Wicker Man, as well as Billy Liar.
"This is one part of a fairly substantial expansion ambition that we have while keeping our domestic projects going."
The Wicker Man, which starred Edward Woodward and Christopher Lee, tells the story of a policeman investigating the disappearance of a young girl amongst a suspicious community.
The movie gained a cult following after its release in the '70s and spawned a 2006 remake starring Nicolas Cage.
The company is keen to adapt feature films such as the 1973 horror movie for the small screen, after being acquired by Studio Canal last year.
The acquisition means that Red has access to the company's vast film library, including The Wicker Man and 1963 movie Billy Liar.
Red's managing director Andrew Critchley told Broadcast: "One of the films we're looking at is The Wicker Man, as well as Billy Liar.
"This is one part of a fairly substantial expansion ambition that we have while keeping our domestic projects going."
The Wicker Man, which starred Edward Woodward and Christopher Lee, tells the story of a policeman investigating the disappearance of a young girl amongst a suspicious community.
The movie gained a cult following after its release in the '70s and spawned a 2006 remake starring Nicolas Cage.
- 3/13/2014
- Digital Spy
Peter O’Toole, best known for his leading role in Lawrence of Arabia, has died, aged 81. He was being treated at London’s Wellington Hospital after a long illness, and passed away on Saturday, his agent has said.
The Irish actor started his career on the stage, and his Hamlet at the Bristol Old Vic back in 1952 was acclaimed by critics. Within a few years, he was chosen to take the part of T.E. Lawrence in David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia, and the rest, as they say, is history.
His performance earned him his first of eight Oscar nominations, and brought him recognition on screens around the world.
In the next twenty years, he would go on to earn a further six nominations for Best Actor, and ultimately go on to accept his Honorary Oscar in 2003, before his eighth and final nomination for Roger Michell’s Venus.
His decades-spanning...
The Irish actor started his career on the stage, and his Hamlet at the Bristol Old Vic back in 1952 was acclaimed by critics. Within a few years, he was chosen to take the part of T.E. Lawrence in David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia, and the rest, as they say, is history.
His performance earned him his first of eight Oscar nominations, and brought him recognition on screens around the world.
In the next twenty years, he would go on to earn a further six nominations for Best Actor, and ultimately go on to accept his Honorary Oscar in 2003, before his eighth and final nomination for Roger Michell’s Venus.
His decades-spanning...
- 12/15/2013
- by Kenji Lloyd
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
The legendary Tom Courtenay delivers a star-making turn as William Terrence Fisher in John Schlesinger's Billy Liar (1963), one of the most memorable and universally acclaimed films of the Swinging Sixties. Now, thanks to StudioCanal, Schlesinger's surrealist kitchen sink drama finally comes to Blu-ray to celebrate the film's 50th Anniversary. To commemorate this very special rerelease of a bona fide British classic, we've kindly been provided with Three Blu-ray copies of Billy Liar to give away to our readers. This is an exclusive competition for our Facebook and Twitter fans, so if you haven't already, 'Like' us at facebook.com/CineVueUK or follow us @CineVue before answering the question below.
Running from an unsympathetic working-class family, a pair of demanding fiancées and an insecure job at an undertakers, Billy (Courtenay) escapes the everyday - Walter Mitty-like - into a world of fantasy where he can realise his dream ambitions. As...
Running from an unsympathetic working-class family, a pair of demanding fiancées and an insecure job at an undertakers, Billy (Courtenay) escapes the everyday - Walter Mitty-like - into a world of fantasy where he can realise his dream ambitions. As...
- 5/9/2013
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
(John Schlesinger, 1963, Studiocanal, 15)
One of the key movies of the British new wave, Billy Liar began life in 1959 as a brilliant comic novel by Keith Waterhouse (clearly influenced by James Thurber's 1939 New Yorker story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty"), and in 1960 Waterhouse and his regular writing partner Willis Hall turned it into a play that Lindsay Anderson directed in the West End. It was filmed 50 years ago this month under the direction of former actor and documentary maker John Schlesinger. Tom Courtenay (who took over the title role on stage from Albert Finney) is superb as the sad 19-year-old Billy Fisher, who escapes from his dreary lower-middle-class background and dead-end job as an undertaker's clerk through his dreams of becoming a writer, his habitual lying, and his fantasies about being a hero in the imaginary country of Ambrosia.
The film takes place over a single busy Saturday during which he juggles two fiancees,...
One of the key movies of the British new wave, Billy Liar began life in 1959 as a brilliant comic novel by Keith Waterhouse (clearly influenced by James Thurber's 1939 New Yorker story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty"), and in 1960 Waterhouse and his regular writing partner Willis Hall turned it into a play that Lindsay Anderson directed in the West End. It was filmed 50 years ago this month under the direction of former actor and documentary maker John Schlesinger. Tom Courtenay (who took over the title role on stage from Albert Finney) is superb as the sad 19-year-old Billy Fisher, who escapes from his dreary lower-middle-class background and dead-end job as an undertaker's clerk through his dreams of becoming a writer, his habitual lying, and his fantasies about being a hero in the imaginary country of Ambrosia.
The film takes place over a single busy Saturday during which he juggles two fiancees,...
- 5/6/2013
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Outstanding actor of stage and screen who made his name as Bri in A Day in the Death of Joe Egg
The British theatre changed for ever when Joe Melia, as the sardonic teacher Bri, pushed a severely disabled 10-year-old girl in a wheelchair on to the stage of the Glasgow Citizens in May 1967 and proceeded to make satirical jokes about the medical profession while his marriage was disintegrating. The play was Peter Nichols's A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, which transformed the way disability was discussed on the stage. It made the names overnight of its author, the director Michael Blakemore, and Melia. Albert Finney took over the role of Bri on Broadway.
Flat-footed, slightly hunched, always leaning towards a point of view, Melia, who has died aged 77, was a distinctive and compassionate actor who brought a strain of the music hall to the stage, a sense of being an outsider.
The British theatre changed for ever when Joe Melia, as the sardonic teacher Bri, pushed a severely disabled 10-year-old girl in a wheelchair on to the stage of the Glasgow Citizens in May 1967 and proceeded to make satirical jokes about the medical profession while his marriage was disintegrating. The play was Peter Nichols's A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, which transformed the way disability was discussed on the stage. It made the names overnight of its author, the director Michael Blakemore, and Melia. Albert Finney took over the role of Bri on Broadway.
Flat-footed, slightly hunched, always leaning towards a point of view, Melia, who has died aged 77, was a distinctive and compassionate actor who brought a strain of the music hall to the stage, a sense of being an outsider.
- 11/7/2012
- by Michael Coveney
- The Guardian - Film News
A classic 1960s working-class drama translates beautifully into a comedy of contemporary British Asian family life
All in Good Time is a touching, likable comedy of life in Lancashire's Hindu community. Though this aspect is little publicised, it's closely based on Bill Naughton's 1965 play of the same title.
Born in Ireland and raised in Bolton, Naughton emerged as a novelist and playwright in the late 50s in the wave of northern working-class writers like Shelagh Delaney, Keith Waterhouse, Alan Sillitoe, David Storey and Stan Barstow. But having been born in 1910 and worked for years as a coal-bagger, cotton-loom operator and lorry driver, Naughton belonged to an earlier generation and was altogether less chippy, aggressive, and self-consciously political about his background.
He enjoyed considerable success in the theatre and had three of his plays filmed, though his most enduringly popular work, the film version of Alfie, completely misrepresented Naughton's radio play,...
All in Good Time is a touching, likable comedy of life in Lancashire's Hindu community. Though this aspect is little publicised, it's closely based on Bill Naughton's 1965 play of the same title.
Born in Ireland and raised in Bolton, Naughton emerged as a novelist and playwright in the late 50s in the wave of northern working-class writers like Shelagh Delaney, Keith Waterhouse, Alan Sillitoe, David Storey and Stan Barstow. But having been born in 1910 and worked for years as a coal-bagger, cotton-loom operator and lorry driver, Naughton belonged to an earlier generation and was altogether less chippy, aggressive, and self-consciously political about his background.
He enjoyed considerable success in the theatre and had three of his plays filmed, though his most enduringly popular work, the film version of Alfie, completely misrepresented Naughton's radio play,...
- 5/12/2012
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
One of the key works in the early British “kitchen sink” movement, John Schlesinger’s screen adaptation of Keith Waterhouse’s seriocomic novel spoke loudly to young people the world over. Tom Courtenay, taking over from Albert Finney in the stage version, made a big enough impression to go on to a strong career. But the revelation here is Julie Christie, luminous as the hero’s free-spirited girlfriend in only her third film role. Schlesinger went on direct her Oscar-winning breakthough two years later with the lead role in Darling.
- 4/18/2012
- by Danny
- Trailers from Hell
Someone actually wants to make a Hollywood film of 80s kids' series Worzel Gummidge? Shouldn't they get their thinking head on?
Age: 76.
Appearance: Scruffy, dirty, turnip for a head.
Either you're looking in a mirror … Very funny.
… Or we're strolling down memory lane. Wasn't this a kids' TV show 30-odd years ago? It certainly was. Worzel was a scarecrow with interchangeable heads for specific activities such as thinking, dancing or working. He had a comedy West Country accent and spent 30 episodes getting into tight spots from which he had to be rescued by a pair of kids. There was nothing he liked more than "a cup o' tea an' a slice o' cake".
Sounds terrible. That's "classic" TV for you.
Who was to blame for it? Barbara Euphan Todd wrote the books, but the TV scripts were by Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall, who also worked together on the film Billy Liar.
Age: 76.
Appearance: Scruffy, dirty, turnip for a head.
Either you're looking in a mirror … Very funny.
… Or we're strolling down memory lane. Wasn't this a kids' TV show 30-odd years ago? It certainly was. Worzel was a scarecrow with interchangeable heads for specific activities such as thinking, dancing or working. He had a comedy West Country accent and spent 30 episodes getting into tight spots from which he had to be rescued by a pair of kids. There was nothing he liked more than "a cup o' tea an' a slice o' cake".
Sounds terrible. That's "classic" TV for you.
Who was to blame for it? Barbara Euphan Todd wrote the books, but the TV scripts were by Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall, who also worked together on the film Billy Liar.
- 2/7/2012
- The Guardian - Film News
Our round-up of John Barry’s non-Bond movie scores continues with a look at some romantic compositions from the disco decade…
As we embark on the fourth part of our appreciation of John Barry’s career beyond Bond, we move into a decade renowned for its glitter balls, bell-bottoms and jiggle television. However, this phase of Barry’s career is representative of a burgeoning interest in more emotionally charged, fractured and complex ideas, viewed through the filter of a maturing, mellowing artist.
Even the most vibrant, exotic scores could not disguise the introspection and sensitivity of the man himself. He continued to chase universal themes – and he was still capable of conjuring up worlds of intrigue and drama – but the projects he gravitated towards more in the wake of Midnight Cowboy were those that allowed him to explore more intimate musical textures.
Barry still accepted a range of eclectic assignments,...
As we embark on the fourth part of our appreciation of John Barry’s career beyond Bond, we move into a decade renowned for its glitter balls, bell-bottoms and jiggle television. However, this phase of Barry’s career is representative of a burgeoning interest in more emotionally charged, fractured and complex ideas, viewed through the filter of a maturing, mellowing artist.
Even the most vibrant, exotic scores could not disguise the introspection and sensitivity of the man himself. He continued to chase universal themes – and he was still capable of conjuring up worlds of intrigue and drama – but the projects he gravitated towards more in the wake of Midnight Cowboy were those that allowed him to explore more intimate musical textures.
Barry still accepted a range of eclectic assignments,...
- 8/15/2011
- Den of Geek
Writer whose novels signalled a sea-change in British literature
Stan Barstow, who has died aged 83, belonged to a generation of working-class writers who became famous in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Like his peers Alan Sillitoe, John Braine, David Storey and Keith Waterhouse, he was born in the depression years of the interwar period and flowered as a novelist in the booming welfare state of postwar Britain. Barstow and his fellow, primarily northern, writers were products of this remarkable transformation in the social landscape of Britain, and their creativity was fuelled by the opportunities and anxieties that such an enormous process of change inevitably generated.
Barstow arrived on the literary scene in 1960 with his first published novel, A Kind of Loving. An unsentimental and unpatronising portrayal of an unhappy marriage, it struck a new note of sombre and sensitive realism. He was riding the crest of a wave: Braine's...
Stan Barstow, who has died aged 83, belonged to a generation of working-class writers who became famous in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Like his peers Alan Sillitoe, John Braine, David Storey and Keith Waterhouse, he was born in the depression years of the interwar period and flowered as a novelist in the booming welfare state of postwar Britain. Barstow and his fellow, primarily northern, writers were products of this remarkable transformation in the social landscape of Britain, and their creativity was fuelled by the opportunities and anxieties that such an enormous process of change inevitably generated.
Barstow arrived on the literary scene in 1960 with his first published novel, A Kind of Loving. An unsentimental and unpatronising portrayal of an unhappy marriage, it struck a new note of sombre and sensitive realism. He was riding the crest of a wave: Braine's...
- 8/2/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
Britain's stages are about to be invaded by drunks. What's the secret to playing a tipsy character? And who is drama's biggest boozer?
Drama frequently holds up a mirror to our drinking habits: think of the booze that casually gets put away in plays as diverse as Pinter's Betrayal, Chekhov's Uncle Vanya, or anything by Tennessee Williams and Sam Shepard. Actors are routinely required to express joy, cry real tears or shed fake blood; yet there is no technical challenge more tricky than the business of drinking on stage. This spring they are getting plenty of practice at mastering the art, as a host of drunk characters are staggering the boards across the country.
Michael Caine once pointed out that a drunk person is actually trying very hard to be sober: therefore acting drunk requires a degree of reverse psychology. Sian Thomas, who is playing Martha in a revival of...
Drama frequently holds up a mirror to our drinking habits: think of the booze that casually gets put away in plays as diverse as Pinter's Betrayal, Chekhov's Uncle Vanya, or anything by Tennessee Williams and Sam Shepard. Actors are routinely required to express joy, cry real tears or shed fake blood; yet there is no technical challenge more tricky than the business of drinking on stage. This spring they are getting plenty of practice at mastering the art, as a host of drunk characters are staggering the boards across the country.
Michael Caine once pointed out that a drunk person is actually trying very hard to be sober: therefore acting drunk requires a degree of reverse psychology. Sian Thomas, who is playing Martha in a revival of...
- 3/24/2011
- by Alfred Hickling
- The Guardian - Film News
Sam Riley is Pinkie in a bold Mods'n'Rockers update of Graham Greene's classic
Keith Waterhouse once wrote that Brighton looked like a town that was helping the police with its inquiries; no less memorably, Brighton resident Julie Burchill wrote that the simple word "esplanade" gave her a secret, sensual thrill. There's something of both these feelings in writer-director Rowan Joffe's bold, intelligent but flawed new version of Graham Greene's Brighton Rock, his noir tale of fear and sin amid the interwar racecourse gangs in Brighton. Here, it's updated to the 1960s world of running seaside battles between Mods and Rockers.
It's an intelligent and creative movie, not a masterpiece, but much better than some rather disobliging reviews have suggested, drawing less on the book than on the 1947 John Boulting film whose screenplay Greene co-wrote with Terence Rattigan. Fans of both, however, may be discontented with the way Joffe handles the ending,...
Keith Waterhouse once wrote that Brighton looked like a town that was helping the police with its inquiries; no less memorably, Brighton resident Julie Burchill wrote that the simple word "esplanade" gave her a secret, sensual thrill. There's something of both these feelings in writer-director Rowan Joffe's bold, intelligent but flawed new version of Graham Greene's Brighton Rock, his noir tale of fear and sin amid the interwar racecourse gangs in Brighton. Here, it's updated to the 1960s world of running seaside battles between Mods and Rockers.
It's an intelligent and creative movie, not a masterpiece, but much better than some rather disobliging reviews have suggested, drawing less on the book than on the 1947 John Boulting film whose screenplay Greene co-wrote with Terence Rattigan. Fans of both, however, may be discontented with the way Joffe handles the ending,...
- 2/4/2011
- by Helen Mirren, Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Sam Riley is Pinkie in a bold Mods'n'Rockers update of Graham Greene's classic
Keith Waterhouse once wrote that Brighton looked like a town that was helping the police with its inquiries; no less memorably, Brighton resident Julie Burchill wrote that the simple word "esplanade" gave her a secret, sensual thrill. There's something of both these feelings in writer-director Rowan Joffe's bold, intelligent but flawed new version of Graham Greene's Brighton Rock, his noir tale of fear and sin amid the interwar racecourse gangs in Brighton. Here, it's updated to the 1960s world of running seaside battles between Mods and Rockers.
It's an intelligent and creative movie, not a masterpiece, but much better than some rather disobliging reviews have suggested, drawing less on the book than on the 1947 John Boulting film whose screenplay Greene co-wrote with Terence Rattigan. Fans of both, however, may be discontented with the way Joffe handles the ending,...
Keith Waterhouse once wrote that Brighton looked like a town that was helping the police with its inquiries; no less memorably, Brighton resident Julie Burchill wrote that the simple word "esplanade" gave her a secret, sensual thrill. There's something of both these feelings in writer-director Rowan Joffe's bold, intelligent but flawed new version of Graham Greene's Brighton Rock, his noir tale of fear and sin amid the interwar racecourse gangs in Brighton. Here, it's updated to the 1960s world of running seaside battles between Mods and Rockers.
It's an intelligent and creative movie, not a masterpiece, but much better than some rather disobliging reviews have suggested, drawing less on the book than on the 1947 John Boulting film whose screenplay Greene co-wrote with Terence Rattigan. Fans of both, however, may be discontented with the way Joffe handles the ending,...
- 2/3/2011
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
The 60s began in Billy Liar's Bradford – but that cultural insurgency now seems a long time ago
In a week with those Camdenites the Milibands stealing away with the Labour leadership race, Andy Burnham's plaint about "metropolitan elites" seems particularly poignant. But then poignancy is the northern tone these days. Mancunians, I found recently, still adduce the Happy Mondays when pressed to say what is distinctive about their home. That the works of this fairly ropey outfit should be taken as a cultural landmark shows what a bleak half century it's been for the north.
I grew up thinking there was a real cachet in being northern. It's 50 years since Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, the 1960 film of Alan Sillitoe's novel, with Albert Finney as a hedonistic machinist in Nottingham. Any youngsters watching him don his suit on the eponymous night must have wished they too were from Pendleton near Salford,...
In a week with those Camdenites the Milibands stealing away with the Labour leadership race, Andy Burnham's plaint about "metropolitan elites" seems particularly poignant. But then poignancy is the northern tone these days. Mancunians, I found recently, still adduce the Happy Mondays when pressed to say what is distinctive about their home. That the works of this fairly ropey outfit should be taken as a cultural landmark shows what a bleak half century it's been for the north.
I grew up thinking there was a real cachet in being northern. It's 50 years since Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, the 1960 film of Alan Sillitoe's novel, with Albert Finney as a hedonistic machinist in Nottingham. Any youngsters watching him don his suit on the eponymous night must have wished they too were from Pendleton near Salford,...
- 9/13/2010
- by Andrew Martin
- The Guardian - Film News
Billy Liar, a story of smalltown frustration, captivated a generation, pre-empted the 60s – and even inspired Oasis. As the stage play returns, Laura Barton asks Tom Courtenay and Julie Christie why it endures
'I don't think about Billy Liar very often." Tom Courtenay's voice hovers on the line. We have been discussing his upcoming holiday to the north-east coast, splashing about in the warm shallows of the present-day; at this detour into the past, he pauses, and retreats a little. "If I read it now, it would make me laugh," he concludes lightly, distantly. "But I honestly don't know why it's lasted. Who can say why some things are successful?"
It is now 50 years since Keith Waterhouse's novel transferred to the stage, casting in its title role first Albert Finney and later, Courtenay. Published in 1959, Billy Liar has, over those five decades, enjoyed a rich and varied existence,...
'I don't think about Billy Liar very often." Tom Courtenay's voice hovers on the line. We have been discussing his upcoming holiday to the north-east coast, splashing about in the warm shallows of the present-day; at this detour into the past, he pauses, and retreats a little. "If I read it now, it would make me laugh," he concludes lightly, distantly. "But I honestly don't know why it's lasted. Who can say why some things are successful?"
It is now 50 years since Keith Waterhouse's novel transferred to the stage, casting in its title role first Albert Finney and later, Courtenay. Published in 1959, Billy Liar has, over those five decades, enjoyed a rich and varied existence,...
- 9/2/2010
- by Laura Barton
- The Guardian - Film News
A Japanese film about a Buddhist mortician is set to be an unlikely commercial success
There aren't many films about the Japanese art of corpse beautification. Still fewer made by a director who previously specialised in soft-core porn and starring an ex-boy band heart-throb. But Departures (Okuribito), which opens in Britain on Friday, is all these things. It won this year's best foreign language Oscar, beating two critically feted films, Waltz with Bashir and The Class.
But why? The film, after all, is hardly a Saturday night no-brainer. Loosely adapted from Aoki Simmons's autobiography Coffinman: The Journal of a Buddhist Mortician, it's about a redundant cellist who finds meaning in his life when he gets a job ceremonially washing bodies, preparing them for entry into the next life. Even in Japan, where films about death and funerals are not uncommon (see Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece Ikiru), the role of the...
There aren't many films about the Japanese art of corpse beautification. Still fewer made by a director who previously specialised in soft-core porn and starring an ex-boy band heart-throb. But Departures (Okuribito), which opens in Britain on Friday, is all these things. It won this year's best foreign language Oscar, beating two critically feted films, Waltz with Bashir and The Class.
But why? The film, after all, is hardly a Saturday night no-brainer. Loosely adapted from Aoki Simmons's autobiography Coffinman: The Journal of a Buddhist Mortician, it's about a redundant cellist who finds meaning in his life when he gets a job ceremonially washing bodies, preparing them for entry into the next life. Even in Japan, where films about death and funerals are not uncommon (see Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece Ikiru), the role of the...
- 11/30/2009
- by Stuart Jeffries
- The Guardian - Film News
Celebrated author and playwright Keith Waterhouse has died at his home in London.
The Billy Liar and Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell writer passed away in his sleep on Friday morning. He was 80.
His death comes after a short undisclosed illness.
Born in Leeds, England, Waterhouse started his career as a clerk in an undertaker's office, which inspired his first bestseller and play, Billy Liar.
He served in the Royal Air Force and then signed on as a reporter for the Yorkshire Evening Post newspaper.
He became a Daily Mirror journalist in the early 1950s and his literary skills were so renowned he frequently wrote speeches for top politicians like Harold Wilson.
He wrote his first novel, There Is A Happy Land, in 1956 and went on to create one of the West End's favourite shows Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell, based on his friend Bernard's weekly Low Life columns in the Spectator magazine.
Waterhouse and Bernard also co-scripted two beloved British films, Whistle Down The Wind and A Kind Of Loving.
He was nominated for the Best British Screenplay BAFTA three years running in the early 1960s.
The Billy Liar and Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell writer passed away in his sleep on Friday morning. He was 80.
His death comes after a short undisclosed illness.
Born in Leeds, England, Waterhouse started his career as a clerk in an undertaker's office, which inspired his first bestseller and play, Billy Liar.
He served in the Royal Air Force and then signed on as a reporter for the Yorkshire Evening Post newspaper.
He became a Daily Mirror journalist in the early 1950s and his literary skills were so renowned he frequently wrote speeches for top politicians like Harold Wilson.
He wrote his first novel, There Is A Happy Land, in 1956 and went on to create one of the West End's favourite shows Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell, based on his friend Bernard's weekly Low Life columns in the Spectator magazine.
Waterhouse and Bernard also co-scripted two beloved British films, Whistle Down The Wind and A Kind Of Loving.
He was nominated for the Best British Screenplay BAFTA three years running in the early 1960s.
- 9/4/2009
- WENN
Award-winning author and playwright Keith Waterhouse died "quietly in his sleep" today at the age of 80, his spokeswoman has confirmed. Leeds-born Waterhouse was one of Britain's most prolific authors, with more than 60 books, plays and television scripts to his name, BBC News reports. The star made his screenwriting debut on 1961 film Whistle Down The Wind. He remains best known for 1959 novel Billy Liar, (more)...
- 9/4/2009
- by By Oli Simpson
- Digital Spy
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