Kind Hearts And Coronets(1949) Set in the stately Edwardian
era, Kind Hearts And Coronets is black comedy at is best, with the most
articulate and literate of all Ealing screenplays.
Sir Alec
Guinness gives a virtuoso performance in his Ealing comedy debut,
playing all eight victims standing between a mass-murderer and his
family fortune. Considered by some to be Ealing's most perfect
achievement of all the Ealing films.
The Ladykillers (1955) Director Alexander Mackendrick's third Ealing farce, is the final
comedy produced by the famous British studio and one of its most
celebrated. Like the equally applauded Kind Hearts And Coronets, the film is more sophisticated and blacker in tone than typically lighthearted Ealing fare (such as Mackendrick's Whiskey Galore!).
Alec Guinness stars as the superbly shifty, toothily threatening
Professor Marcus, the leader of a crime ring planning a heist.
Marcus
rents rooms from a sweet, eccentric old lady, Mrs. Wilberforce (Katie
Johnson), in her crooked London house. The professor and his
co-conspirators, blowhard Major Courtney (Cecil Parker), creepily suave
Louis (Herbert Lom), chubby Harry (Peter Sellers), and muscleman
One-Round (Danny Green), pose as an unlikely string quartet using the
rooms for rehearsal. Dodging Mrs. Wilberforce's constant interruptions,
the hoods hit upon the idea to use her in the daring daylight robbery
(filmed in and around London's King's Cross station). When the old girl
discovers the truth, Marcus and company cannot persuade her to stay
buttoned up about it and thus decide to do her in. Accompanied by a
noirish cacophony of screeching trains, parrots, and little old ladies
at afternoon tea, a series of unlikely events builds to the hilarious,
surprising finale.
The Man In The White Suit(1951) Sidney Stratton (Alec Guinness) works quietly at Michael Corland's
(Michael Gough) textile mill until his mysterious, costly lab
experiment is discovered. Fired by Corland, Stratton takes a menial job
at Alan Birnley's (Cecil Parker) mill in order to continue his work on
the sly. When Daphne (Joan Greenwood), Corland's fiancée and Birnley's
daughter, discovers his secret, she threatens to expose Stratton. The
desperate scientist reveals to Daphne that he has invented an
indestructible cloth that never gets dirty. Close to realizing his
vision, Stratton celebrates by having a white suit made of the fabric
(because it repels dye). The trouble, however, is just beginning. The
lowly mill workers (who spout market economics in rough accents) fear
for their jobs while the mill owners, led by the decrepit
Godfather-esque Sir John Kierlaw (Ernest Thesiger), worry about their
profits.
Passport To Pimlico (1949) An archaic
document found in a bombsite reveals that the London district of
Pimlico has for centuries technically been part of France. The local
residents embrace their new found continental status, seeing it as a
way to avoid the drabness, austerity and rationing of post-war England.
The authorities do not, however, share their enthusiasm...
The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) Mr. Holland (Alec Guinness) has supervised the bank's bullion run for
years. He is fussy and unnecessarily overprotective, but everyone knows
he is absolutely trustworthy. And so, on the day the bullion truck is
robbed, he is the last person to be suspected. But there is another
side to Mr. Holland; he is also Dutch, the leader of the Lavender Hill
Mob.
None specified Alec Guinness, Dennis Price, Valerie Hobson, Joan Greenwood, Miles
Malleson, Clive Morton, John Salew, Laurence Naismith, Richard Wattis,
Carol White, Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom, Cecil Parker, Danny Green, Jack Warner,
Katie Johnson, Philip Stainton, Frankie Howerd, Kenneth Conner, Harold
Goodwin, Stratford Johns, Sam Kydd, Arthur Mullard, Cecil Parker, Michael Gough, Ernest Thesier, Stanley Holloway, Betty Warren, Jane Hylton. Hermionne Baddeley,
Charles Hawtry, Margaret Rutherford, Basil Radford, Michael Hordern,
Bill Shine, Harry Locke, Sam Kydd, James Hayter, Michael Craig, Sid James, Alfie Bass, Majorie Fielding, John Salew, John Gregson, Audrey Hepburn, William (James) Fox, Meredith Edwards, Robert Shaw, Richard Wattis
Various
432 mins
1949 - 1955
None specified
English
5
2 - will only play on UK / European DVD player or multi region
player
Usually despatched within 5 working days
