period drama
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STIFF UPPER LIPS
I discovered this amusing parody of all those Merchant/Ivory British period costume dramas when researching the work of late great Peter Ustinov, and it rather tickled me to be reminded of how very silly Brit comedies can be. This one is like an EM Forster novel (with a nod to Thomas Mann’s ‘Death in…
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THE EYE OF THE STORM
There is something quite deliciously old-fashioned about veteran Australian director Fred Schepisi’s latest movie that gives you the distinct feeling that it actually may have been made 20 years ago. It’s all about a domineering matriarch who has been a total control freak all her life : staff, children and local society, and now she…
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THE MASTER
Freddie Quell is a real mess. After being discharged from the US Navy where he served in the Pacific Fleet in WW2 he has serious psychological issues and a fierce short-fused temper that will not allow him to adapt back into civilian life at all, and so he drifts from job to job until one…
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Anna Karenina
Even though this is the 25th time that Tolstoy’s classic novel has been brought to the screen, I think this is the first version that I have ever seen. The latest rendition has been re-written by leading playwright Sir Tom Stoppard, and I gather it sticks closely to the original plot even though he’s squeezed it into 2 hours. (Thank…
