Alan Williams

The Cockroach That Ate Cincinnati

A colorful character's monologues on pop culture provide biting social commentary even as they descend into madness.

Mistress Madeleine

Part of the Daughters of the Country series, this film, set in the 1850s, unfolds against the backdrop of the Hudson's Bay Company's monopoly of the fur trade. In protest, some Métis engage in trade with the Americans. Madeleine, the Métis common-law wife of a Hudson's Bay Company clerk, is torn between loyalty to her husband and loyalty to her brother, a freetrader. Even more shattering, a change in company policy destroys Madeleine's happy and secure life, forcing her to re-evaluate her identity.

Grow Your Own

A refugee family are given an allotment plot and are met with suspicion by the people who have worked the gardens for years

The Dreamed Path

Theres and Kenneth are both young when they first meet whilst on holiday. They fall in love but are unable to prevent themselves from losing each other. Thirty years later, in another country, another couple: Ariane leaves her husband David because she no longer loves him. The paths they both take lead them to Kenneth and Theres.

National Theatre Live: Faith, Hope & Charity

In a run-down community hall on the edge of town, a woman has been cooking lunch for those in need. A choir is starting up, run by a volunteer who’s looking for a new beginning. A mother is seeking help in her fight to keep her young daughter from being taken into care. An older man sits silently in the corner, the first to arrive, the last to leave. Outside the rain is falling. Alexander Zeldin’s new play is another uncompromising theatrical experience that goes to the heart of our uncertain times.

A Waste of Shame: The Mystery of Shakespeare and His Sonnets

In 1609, William Shakespeare published a collection of 154 sonnets, creating what is arguably the greatest lyric sequence in English literature - and at the center of this masterpiece lies a mystery that has endured for centuries. What are the identities of “the young man” and “the dark lady” to whom all but two of the sonnets allude? This moving performance brings to life the gritty reality of Shakespeare’s England, bits of the Bard’s plays and poems, and the consummate poet and dramatist himself as it exposes these personages unseen but so keenly felt in Shakespeare’s sonnets and in his life. Rupert Graves, Tom Sturridge, Indira Varma, Anna Chancellor, and Zoë Wanamaker star. Contains mature themes and explicit language. Some content may be objectionable. Produced by the Open University.

The After

After losing a family member to a violent crime, a shattered rideshare driver picks up a passenger that forces him to confront his grief.

Among Giants

A manager hires Ray, off the books, to paint all the power towers in a 15-mile stretch of high-tension wires outside Sheffield. Ray's crew of men are friends, especially Ray with Steve, a young Romeo. Into the mix comes Gerry, an Australian with a spirit of adventure and mountain climbing skills. She wants a job, and against the others' advice, who don't want a woman on the job, Ray hires her. Then she and Ray fall in love. He asks her to marry him, gives her a ring. Steve's jealous; Ray's ex-wife complains that he spends on Gerry, not his own kids, and she predicts that Gerry won't stay around. Plus, there's pressure to finish the job fast. Economics, romance, and wanderlust spark the end.

Pulse

A year after her mother's death, Hannah resumes her training at one of the country's top teaching hospitals. She is soon terrified by strange visions and the threatening behaviour of her ex-boyfriend and star surgeon Nick and wonders if she has come back too soon. But beneath the hospital's reputation of medical excellence she discovers a secret network of dangerous experiments pushing back the boundaries of science.

Bright Young Things

During the 1930s in England, a group of young socialites dominate the national gossip with extravagant and outlandish antics. Among the group is the aspiring novelist Adam Fenwick-Symes, who is attempting to raise enough money to marry fellow member Nina Blount. However, after customs officials confiscate his first manuscript, Fenwick-Symes must recover from the financial setback and figure out new ways to earn money for a wedding.

Vera Drake

Abortionist Vera Drake finds her beliefs and practices clash with the mores of 1950s Britain – a conflict that leads to tragedy for her family.

London Boulevard

A parolee falls for a reclusive movie star while trying to evade a ruthless gangster.

All or Nothing

Penny works at a supermarket and Phil is a gentle taxi-driver. Penny’s love for Phil has run dry and they lead joyless lives with their two children, Rachel, a cleaner, and Rory, who is unemployed and aggressive.

National Theatre Live: Till The Stars Come Down

It’s Sylvia and Marek’s wedding and you are all invited. Over the course of a hot summer’s day, a family gathers to welcome a newcomer into their midst. But as the vodka flows and dances are shared, passions boil over and the limits of love are tested. What happens when the happiest day of your life opens the door to a new, frightening and uncertain future?

Trespass Against Us

Three generations of the rowdy Cutler family live as outlaws in some of Britain's richest countryside – hunting hares, ram-raiding stately homes, and taunting the police. Struggling to retain a way of life fast becoming extinct, Chad Cutler ends up caught between his father's archaic principles and trying to do right by his kids, whilst the full force of the law is finally catching up with him.

Vinyl

Toronto filmmaker Alan Zweig analyzes the phenomenon of record collecting.

The Scold's Bridle

Detective Cooper investigates the bizarre circumstances surrounding the murder of Matilda who was found dead in her bath wearing the Scold's Bridle.

Heartlands

Gentle Colin 'Col' Lawes happily lead a quiet life, running a news agency with his soiled-rotten wife Sandra and playing competition darts in the Atletic Arms team. Colin catches her committing adultery with team captain Geoff, a cop, who pretends Colin abused her. Col is thrown off the team just after it qualified for the league finals in Blackpool. He decides to travel there alone, hoping to win her back.

Elephant Juice

The story of Billy, Will, Jules, Daphne and Dodie, a group of people who prove that there are no secrets between friends. It all comes out in the end.

Getting Hurt

The safe, secure, boring life of Charlie Cross, a wealthy, successful solicitor is irretrievably shattered when he embarks on an illicit, passionate affair with the beautiful, mysterious Viola whom he meets one evening whilst investigating the background of her husband, Edgar Bosco.

Peterloo

An epic portrayal of the events surrounding the infamous 1819 Peterloo Massacre, where a peaceful pro-democracy rally at St Peter’s Field in Manchester turned into one of the bloodiest and most notorious episodes in British history. The massacre saw British government forces charge into a crowd of over 60,000 that had gathered to demand political reforms and protest against rising levels of poverty.

The Lost Garden: The Life and Cinema of Alice Guy-Blaché

A biodoc about the first female filmmaker and her relative disappearance from the history of cinema after directing, producing, and writing more than 700 films.

Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché

The epic life story of Alice Guy-Blaché (1873–1968), a French screenwriter, director and producer, true pioneer of cinema, the first person who made a narrative fiction film; author of hundreds of movies, but banished from history books. Ignored and forgotten. At last remembered.

Sometimes Always Never

Alan is a stylish tailor with moves as sharp as his suits. He has spent years searching tirelessly for his missing son Michael who stormed out over a game of Scrabble. With a body to identify and his family torn apart, Alan must repair the relationship with his youngest son and solve the mystery of an online player who he thinks could be Michael, so he can finally move on and reunite his family.

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers

The turbulent personal and professional life of actor Peter Sellers (1925-1980), from his beginnings as a comic performer on BBC Radio to his huge success as one of the greatest film comedians of all time; an obsessive artist so dedicated to his work that neglected his loved ones and sacrificed part of his own personality to convincingly create that of his many memorable characters.

I Was at Home, But...

After a 13-year-old student disappears without a trace for a week and suddenly reappears, his mother and teachers are confronted with existential questions that change their whole view of life.