The Foreman of an Old Bailey jury refuses to accept circumstantial evidence and helps solve murder case.
Ebenezer Scrooge malcontentedly shuffles through life as a cruel, miserly businessman, until he is visited by three spirits on Christmas Eve who show him how his unhappy childhood and adult behavior has left him a selfish, lonely old man.
Edward "Teddy" Bare is a ruthless schemer who thinks he's hit the big time when he kills his older wife, believing he will inherit a fortune. When things don't go according to plan, Teddy sets his sights on a new victim: wealthy widow Freda Jeffries. Unfortunately for the unscrupulous criminal, Freda is much more guarded and sassy than his last wife, making separating her from her money considerably more challenging.
British Egyptologist Professor Morlant seeks immortality through a jewel buried in the tomb of an Oriental idol. Upon his death, Morlant returns to Earth to seek vengeance upon those who removed the jewel from his grave.
Mismatched travellers are stranded overnight at a lonely rural railway station. They soon learn of local superstition about a phantom train which is said to travel these parts at dead of night, carrying ghosts from a long-ago train wreck in the area.
The hero discovers his estranged wife dead and tries to frame her lover for the murder. He becomes involved with the criminals who make various unsuccessful attempts on his life while the police clear up the mystery.
A Scottish civil servant must learn how to drive a Bentley to impress his girlfriend's tycoon father.
A 1930s British summer Bank Holiday starts at midday on Saturday with a rush for the trains to the seaside. Doreen and Milly are off to a beauty contest, Geoffrey and Catherine are having an illicit weekend in the Grand Hotel and May and the kids are set for a more straightforward holiday of sea, sand, and pub. Meanwhile, the manager and performers on the pier are praying for rain.
A disgraced school master, Benjamin Twist, is mistaken for a tough prison governor and assigned the charge of a prison for particularly hardened criminals. Believing he is being sent to a school rather than a prison, he celebrates accordingly only to find that his drunkenness accidently lands him on the wrong side of the prison bars. The Governorship is eventually restored to him, and he sets about popularising himself amongst the convicts by turning a blind eye to their shady dealings.
The son of a notorious hangman is gradually becoming insane and he finds himself unable to resist the urge to strangle women to death.
In Britain, a man with a shady past uses his antiquities shop as a front for smuggled diamonds but his young shop-assistant starts blackmailing him, leading to murder and to a police investigation.
Wealthy widow Mrs. Bramson notices that her maid is distracted, and when she learns the girl's fiancé, Danny, is the reason, she summons him in. Mrs. Bramson's niece Olivia takes a liking to Danny, and comes to believe that he may have been involved in the disappearance of a local woman.
In pre-WW1 England, a youngster is expelled from a naval academy over a petty theft, but his parents raise a political furor by demanding a trial.
When ship's fireman Peter McCabe walks out on his long-suffering wife, he leaves her impoverished, with two young daughters and a boy born soon after his departure. After an absence of fourteen years McCabe returns, sacked and humiliated, trailing trouble in his wake.
A bitter burglar, a prostitute and an elderly shoplifter spend their first day out of jail.
Once a Crook is a 1941 British crime film directed by Herbert Mason and featuring Gordon Harker, Sydney Howard, Bernard Lee, Kathleen Harrison, and Raymond Huntley.
A prison governor deals with a variety of different prisoners, including a charming murderer.
W. Somerset Maugham introduces three more of his stories about human foibles.
Petty thief Willie Frith steals a suitcase full of bank notes, only to find out that they have been given all the same serial number. But this is only the start of his troubles, now he has to find a way of changing the notes, so he can impress the barmaid of his local pub.
Tricked into joining the RAF by a wily judge, wide boy Horace Pope sets his sights on the main chance, teams with slow-witted, good-hearted gypsy Pedlar Pascoe, and works up a lucrative racket in conning both his colleagues and the RAF. By means of various devious schemes Pope and Pascoe manage to avoid the front lines until they are sent to France - where they find themselves making unexpected and uncomfortably close contact with the enemy.
Escaping British prisoners of war hide out in German occupied France.
Three sailors on leave turn a British town upside down.
A man is blackmailed into taking his brother's place in a gang for a jewellery heist.
A British coastal command pilot is charged with neglect when it is thought that he has sunk a British submarine rather than a German U-boat. Unable to live with his actions, he volunteers for a deadly mission. His girlfriend meanwhile tries to prove that he is innocent.
Three elderly residents of a nursing home, fed up with their monotonous existence, engineer an escape from their drab surroundings and head for an impromptu holiday on an Irish island.
The famous detective and his trusty side-kick, Tinker, are called in by the War Office to find some important papers that were stolen from a man killed during an air raid.
Charts the events occurring during a typical 24-hour period on London’s thoroughfare Bond Street. Linking the four stories together is the impending wedding of society girl Hazel Court and Robert Flemyng.
A young woman who comes to Liverpool for domestic employment and finds romance with a young sailor who winds up in hospital after a fight.
A firm of solicitors do battle with the head of the local council over a parcel of river front land, owned by the Huggett family, in order to build a lido/community center.
Life is not going well for the Huggetts. Father has lost his job. Jimmy and his wife cannot get to South Africa where he has a new job. So the family decide that they should go to South Africa by truck. With their travelling companion they travel across the desert which includes a brush with the law.
The Huggetts have their first telephone installed, sleep rough on The Mall whilst waiting for the Royal Wedding and deal with a fire at the 'Oatibix' factory.
The Huggett family go to a holiday camp, and get involved in crooked card players, a murderer on the run, and a pregnant young girl and her boyfriend missing from home.
A young actress must decide which of two lovers will be her husband. She daydreams about each one to help her decide.
A simple handyman, who also is an amateur artist, gets into trouble when the head and shoulders portraits of some prominent local females are sold without his knowledge to an advertising agency and are published with nude bodies added to them.
A Cockney family inherit a ramshackle Devon farm. The rest of the family don't want to leave London but the father insists and off they go, to face the unknown.
When the Government decide to build a Festival of Britain exhibition site, everything goes to plan, all except the fact that the main road and the pedestrian subway into the site, are blocked by a little corner shop, which is owned and run by a Mr. Lord and his family. When the Lords refuse to be bought off, and decline the compensation offered by the authorities. the police and the bailiffs try to evict them, only to come under fire from the family, who have barricaded themselves inside the shop.
Two aspiring songwriters finally manage to sell a tune by claiming that it was composed by a reclusive musical genius. When the tune hits the top of the charts, they find themselves having to produce the "real" composer.
Two evacuee children living in the United States receive a letter from their mother, Mrs Taylor, telling them of her life in Blitz-era London. Glimpses of the events of Mrs Taylor's typical day, including ration shopping and fire warden training, belie the letter's innocuous statements.
The story of a harbor signalman who retrieves a suitcase full of money after witnessing a murder, fails to report it to the police, and finds himself the object of murderous and mercenary interest.
According to the terms of a will two strangers must marry. Leila (Jessie Matthews) is an English widow, and Fergus (Ian Hunter) is a Canadian bachelor. Both are bequeathed a fortune, but there is a condition to receive it; the two must marry within a year. To aid matters, Leila disguises herself as Fergus' maid, and the two begin to fall in love. However, when Fergus discovers the truth, he is less than pleased by the deception.
Bittersweet story about London's unwanted children and the good people trying to help them. Ann is a social worker, while Bill is an electrician whose contract with the local care home introduces him to the children and Ann. Events start to escalate out of control when a child takes possession of a loaded gun.
Inspector Bradley of Scotland Yard is on the trail of the murderous ringleader of a smuggling organization in London.
A run-away school-girl falls among chorus girls planning to marry into the nobility.
Sir Douglas Rolls is a highly respected defence lawyer of many years experience. Now in rapidly failing health, he is advised to retreat from the courtroom and pursue more pleasurable activities. But it is just at this point in his life that his great lost love a woman his own strong sense of duty led him to give up twenty years ago, and whom he still loves deeply walks into his chambers to ask that he defend her adulterous husband, now to stand trial for murder. Reluctantly agreeing to take on the case, Sir Douglas soon finds there is more to the story than meets the eye.
A missing formula, a defecting Eastern European scientist kidnapped, car chases, foot chases, air chases, the British secret service, and a couple of American tourists caught right in the middle.
When George discovers that he has won the pools, there is huge excitement in the household. But it turns out that it's his son who has won, in partnership with the son of a woman against whom George has some ill feelings.
Twenty years removed from Alice Barlow's murder by a thief looking for her jewels, newlyweds Paul and Bella Mallen move into the very house where the crime was committed. Retired detective B.G. Rough, who worked on the Barlow case, is still in the area and grows suspicious of Paul, who he feels bears a striking resemblance to one of Barlow's relatives. Rough must find the truth before the killer can strike again and reclaim his bounty.
An elderly lady manages to sneak some pills away from her nurse and dies of an overdose. The nurse is tried for murder and acquitted. Some time later the nurse, under a new name and identity, cares for a patient who also dies of an overdose. When her real identity comes out, suspicions arise.
George Winter, a self-made businessman and MP, lets nothing get in the way of his climb to the top. Certain in his belief in the corruptible and foolish nature of others, whenever Winter meets a competitor who can't be bought, he destroys the man through methods both legal and underhanded. Then, he meets his 'tenth man': a victim who refuses to be silenced by threat or bribery, with the power to bring Winter's house of cards crashing down around him.
A controversial osteopath sets out to cure the daughter of a famous surgeon - and falls in love with her in the process.
Because his father, Lord Grenham, spends more time philandering with attractive women than conducting business, Willie Tatham is forced to interrupt his honeymoon with his wife Margot in the south of France and return to London to get his father to sign an important contract. While Margot, an actress, goes to a small resort where she will not be recognized, Kitty Lake, one of the young women Lord Grenham pursues, flirts with Willie. Two weeks pass and when Willie tells Margot on the telephone that he must stay in town, she threatens to engage in a violent flirtation with the next attractive man she sees. Karl von der Heide, from Vienna, who is waiting to use the telephone, overhears her and begins a flirtation. She identifies herself to him as Mrs. Margaret Spaulding, and they pursue the beginnings of a romance until Margot suddenly returns home.
On a journey from Paris to London, a Briton, a Frenchman and an American bond with each other and indulge in a romantic fantasy about a girl they see.
A group of children establish their own zoo in the garden of a disused house, which proves to be the headquarters of a gang of crooks.
Two businessmen have the shock of their lives when a woman appears out of their past bearing a 23 year old son - and one of them may be the father!
Classic comedy starring Arthur Askey. The perils, humiliations and humour of trying to run a second-rate theatrical company are further compounded when financial aid, given by the former famous music-hall star Lady Randall (Lily Morris), is withdrawn. Not to be defeated, the stars decide the show must go on and devise a plan to persuade her to reinvest
Young Raymond Rudford,sculptor, is on trial for slitting the throat of his uncle, who had adopted and raised him after Raymond's parent's died when he was a young boy. The prosecution allows his motive was fear of being disinherited if he married his fiancé, the fair Alicia Atherton, against his uncle's wishes, and the prosecution lays a mountain of evidence against Raymond, including his razor, dragged from an artificial lake on the estate, as the murder weapon; Raymond's bloody fingerprints and footprints found at the scene of bedroom crime, and his bloody shoes, found in his cupboard and bloody monogrammed-handkerchief found under his uncle's death bed. Raymond's only defense is that he could not have committed the crime as he goes into a paroxysm of dread at the mere sight of blood, a phobia he has had ever since childhood when his dog was run over by a lorry and the dog's blood was splattered into his face.
Idealistic young Barbara is the daughter of rich weapons manufacturer Andrew Undershaft. She rebels against her estranged father by joining the Salvation Army. Wooed by professor-turned-preacher Adolphus Cusins, Barbara eventually grows disillusioned with her causes and begins to see things from her father's perspective.
Now old, ill, poor, and largely forgotten, William Freise-Greene was once very different. As young and handsome William Green he changed his name to include his first wife's so that it sounded more impressive for the photographic portrait work he was so good at. But he was also an inventor and his search for a way to project moving pictures became an obsession that ultimately changed the life of all those he loved.
When 9-year-old orphan Oliver Twist dares to ask his cruel taskmaster, Mr. Bumble, for a second serving of gruel, he's hired out as an apprentice. Escaping that dismal fate, young Oliver falls in with the street urchin known as the Artful Dodger and his criminal mentor, Fagin. When kindly Mr. Brownlow takes Oliver in, Fagin's evil henchman Bill Sikes plots to kidnap the boy.
A coarse boot-shop owner becomes outraged when his eldest daughter decides to marry a meek cobbler.
A Chinese missionary comes to England and helps a young girl ill-treated by her father. A remake of D. W. Griffith's masterpiece.
Carroll Levis brings newly discovered talent to the screen.
In Notting Hill's jazz club, coffee bar and bedsit land of the early 1960s, Joe Beckett is a young unemployed misfit and drifter whose life takes a turn for the worse when he encounters Richard Dyce, an ex-army officer.
In a Swiss Alpine resort shortly after the War an army officer and upper-class Humpy Miller both set their sights on Mary, the landlord's daughter. When the two come down with chicken pox they are put in the charge of fellow guest Miss Cartwright, who turns out to be Humpy's old nanny. The two Englishmen unite not only against her tyranny but against a dense Greek who is also after Mary.
For ten years, The Terror has laughed at both police and public. And for ten years, two of his erstwhile associates, Joe Conner and 'Soapy' Marks, have plotted revenge on the mastermind whose double-crossing sent them to Dartmoor prison without their share of the bullion stolen in a daring raid.
A new batch of Army recruits, from diverse backgrounds and with varying degrees of commitment, is shaped into an efficient fighting unit.
The Very Reverend Richard Jedd has a problem: the church spire, now in a parlous state of repair, will cost nearly £1,000 to fix. When various money-raising schemes go awry, he is persuaded to waive his principles and bet what’s left of his savings on Dandy Dick, a 10-1 odds-on at the local races. A simple tonic to enhance the nag’s performance seems a good idea… but when the butler decides to intervene, the respectable clergyman finds himself in the middle of a doping scandal – and worse!
The story of the HMS Torrin, from its construction to its sinking in the Mediterranean during action in World War II. The ship’s first and only commanding officer is Captain E.V. Kinross, who trains his men not only to be loyal to him and the country, but—most importantly—to themselves.
The Pickwick Club sends Mr. Pickwick and a group of friends to travel across England and to report back on the interesting things they find...
Proud Irishwoman Bridie Quilty journeys to Dublin while World War II rages across Europe. During her travels, she encounters J. Miller, who recruits her as a Nazi spy. She acquires the necessary information that leads to the breakout of a German spy who holds key information about the Allies' newest offensive plans. However, the arrival of British officer David Baynes and his romancing of Bridie lead to unexpected consequences.
A married couple are mistaken for jewel thieves and forced to go to a party. The husband turns on the burglar alarm by mistake and the real thieves are captured.
The aging Julius Caesar finds himself intrigued by the young Egyptian queen Cleopatra.
An impending V.I.P. visit causes bustle in an English village, while the Ellis family struggles with private problems.
Wartime propaganda short in which a professor enlists the help of a dustman to explain the importance of saving paper, bones and metal to help the war effort.
"What a life for a couple of nudes!" Two dancers find a new way of doing their bit for the boys in this frothy wartime propaganda short. Lord Kitchener's famous finger persuades Joan and Ireen, dancers in a 'Non Stop Nudes' revue (not that we see anything that warrants that title), to make a radical career change. Swapping their skimpy costumes for dowdy munitions factory overalls, they join a growing domestic army of women keeping the machines rolling. Belfast-born Brian Desmond Hurst was essentially a feature film director, whose best-remembered work is the Dickens adaptation Scrooge, but whose credits also included the war films Dangerous Moonlight (1941) and The Malta Story (1953). The Call for Arms was one of three propaganda shorts he made between 1940 and 1941, the most memorable being Miss Grant Goes to the Door, in which a pair of village spinsters outwit a Nazi paratrooper.
During WW2 a former railway employee who had been drafted, goes AWOL to hunt down the spiv and draft dodger who is having an affair with his wife.
A behind the scene look at Petula Clark's working day in 1948 on "Here Come the Huggetts".
A French sleuth in England helps the police solve a series of murders linked by the diary pages of a dead woman.
Two convicts escape from prison, complicating life for their widowed mother when they return home to hide out.
Celebrating the life and career of legendary British blonde bombshell Diana Dors, who died in 1984. Friends remember her affectionately and film clips illustrate her big screen movie roles.