This is going to sound odd, but there are two films that spring to mind: Dead of Night from 1945 and Theatre of Blood from 1973, both of which I saw as part of the Vancouver International Film Festival in the 1980s. I already knew both, but seeing Dead of Night on the big screen, with a packed house, was incredible;…

Don't panic, Captain Mainwaring!

I use this line a lot.

The untimely death, a couple of days ago, of British comedian Victoria Wood lends some poignancy to this otherwise hilarious - and pitch-perfect - parody of Brief Encounter, starring Wood as Laura, Bill Patterson as Alec, and Celia Imrie as Dolly. 'I've a nice tin of orange pekoe I keep for the middle classes.'

I think I feel about Wedgewood on the British version as Teti feels about Tiffany lamps on the American show: if I die before I see another one, I'd be fine with that.

There was a real Night of the Living Dead vibe to the Willa-Melissa-George scene near the end. I guess if you're going to rip off another zombie film, pick one of the classics.

Dorothy Parker once famously remarked that Basil Rathbone looked like 'two profiles pasted together', which beautifully captures not only Rathbone, but the Sidney Paget illustrations of Holmes in the early adventures (he died, aged only 48, after the stories collected as The Return of Sherlock Holmes were published). …

Rathbone was my first Holmes, and like Doctor Who, I think the first actor you see in the role of Holmes is your favourite (unless the first Holmes film you stumble across is something like Sherlock Holmes in New York, in which case I'm really sorry). I recognise that for a lot of people, the (then) modern-day-set…

So: are you saying the voice Nick heard was Stevie Wayne? Someone's radio was tuned to WKAB?

Such a great film, and as Mike D'Angelo notes, it's almost impossible to slot it into one overarching box: romance, comedy, drama, action, adventure. Maybe this is why it kind of flies under the radar (no pun intended) when great films of 1939 are mentioned. I was watching a special on TCM about The Wizard of Oz…

Ultravox: 'Dancing With Tears in My Eyes'.

He really enjoyed the game, but it got to the point where the only way he could advance much further was by serious cash outlays, which he wasn't willing to do.

No, I mean the star-studded (for Russia) New Year's Eve music and comedy specials, hosted by one or both of Filipp Kirkorov and Maxim Galkin; Nikolai Baskov usually shows up, along with two guys who play babushkas, and a comedian who reminds me a lot of Royal Canadian Air Farce's Roger Abbott. They're quite a lot of…

I'll go look. . . .

True story: about three years ago my son, aged 15 then, got interested in tanks via an online game he played ('World of Tanks', I think). This led to him researching the various tanks, and he was particularly interested in the Russian ones. One thing led to another, and suddenly he was teaching himself to read, speak,…

That Russian scientist was played by the great Sir Nigel Hawthorne; his character is the main thing I remember from the movie.

Apparently Lancaster was cast because Visconti needed a big star to make the film bankable and get funding from an American studio (Lancaster said that 20th Century-Fox gave the filmmaker $3 million). Laurence Olivier was the first choice, but he was too busy, so Lancaster got the role; and he is undoubtedly perfect…

Superb adaptation of a great novel (although I'll always love the 1944 Rene Clair version, which has a distinct vein of black comedy running through it).

Melissa McBride is awesome. I've thought for a while that Carol's story arc, and McBride's acting, have been the best thing about the show. Glad to see that affirmed tonight.

You spelled 'harbour' wrong. A Canadian. . . .