Garrick Hagon

A visual essay by writer and filmmaker Jon Spira exploring the evolution of Silent Running's screenplay

A team of American parapsychologists travel to Wales to conduct a study of Margam Castle, one of the UK's most haunted buildings.

A documentary about ten very different lives connected by having appeared onscreen wearing masks or helmets in Star Wars.

Back in January 2015 I had the pleasure of talking to Garrick Hagon aka Biggs about his role in Star Wars.

Retired C.I.A. agent Frank Moses reunites his unlikely team of elite operatives for a global quest to track down a missing portable nuclear device.

A former agent of the CIA and his estranged daughter go on the run after his employers target them for assassination.

Two investigators of paranormal hoaxes, the veteran Dr. Margaret Matheson and her young assistant, Tom Buckley, study the most varied metaphysical phenomena with the aim of proving their fraudulent origins. Simon Silver, a legendary blind psychic, reappears after an enigmatic absence of 30 years to become the greatest international challenge to both orthodox science and professional sceptics. Tom starts to develop an intense obsession with Silver, whose magnetism becomes stronger with each new manifestation of inexplicable events. As Tom gets closer to Silver, tension mounts, and his worldview is threatened to its core.

A modern take on the classic fairytale, Alice in Wonderland, set in South East England.An American law student in London. Knocked down by a black cab, she wakes with amnesia in a world that's a million miles from home - Wonderland. We follow her adventures as she's dragged through an underworld filled with twisted individuals and the lowest low-lifers, by the enigmatic cab driver, Whitey. She needs to find out who she is, where she's from and use what wits she has left to get back home in one piece. As her journey progresses she discovers nothing is what it seems, realizes that fate and life are terminally entwined, and finds true love lurking in the unlikeliest place.

New York, 1937. A teenager hired to star in Orson Welles' production of Julius Caesar becomes attracted to a career-driven production assistant.

A westerner named Casey, studying Ninjutsu in Japan, is asked by the Sensei to return to New York to protect the legendary Yoroi Bitsu, an armored chest that contains the weapons of the last Koga Ninja.

A young boy who lives in an old folks' home strikes up a friendship with a retired magician.

The true story of the legendary German Shepherd who was found by American pilot Lee Duncun in France during World War I, and later became the most famous animal star in Hollywood history.

Nathan becomes a super hero style of character in people's dreams to rescue them from their nightmares, only to realize he's not the only one. Not only that, but he has been manipulated to become one by them in order to help these good guys defeat a new foe, the Nemesis. Nathan is reluctant at first but comes around to figure out exactly where the Nemesis is coming from, and why, and how they might be able to stop it.

From the mean streets of the Belleville district of Paris to the dazzling limelight of New York's most famous concert halls, Edith Piaf's life was a constant battle to sing and survive, to live and love. Raised in her grandmother's brothel, Piaf was discovered in 1935 by nightclub owner Louis Leplee, who persuaded her to sing despite her extreme nervousness. Piaf became one of France's immortal icons, her voice one of the indelible signatures of the 20th century.

An escort who caters to Washington D.C.'s society ladies becomes involved in a murder case.

In the Nazi-occupied Netherlands during World War II, a Jewish singer infiltrates the regional Gestapo headquarters for the Dutch resistance.

An intelligence operative discovers that no one is what they seem in the shadowy world of espionage.

Armed insurgents attempt a coup d'etat in a troubled Eastern European country, and the president flees to the U.S. embassy for protection. When the U.S. ambassador is murdered by the ruthless and gun-happy rebels, it comes down to the second-in-command of the embassy, Sam Keenan, played by Belgian kickboxer Jean-Claude Van Damme, to use his amazing martial arts technique to defend the besieged.

Still reeling from the painful breakup of his marriage to screen siren Rita Hayworth, filmmaker Orson Welles makes his way to Rome, where he gets pulled into a tangled political plot involving murder and mysterious motives. A beautiful actress proves a tempting distraction. But if they want to stay alive, Welles and his young Italian driver need to stay focused.

A young boy wins a tour through the most magnificent chocolate factory in the world, led by the world's most unusual candy maker.

The President's daughter, unable to experience life like a normal 18 year-old, escapes from her entourage of Secret Service agents while traveling in Europe. She falls in love with a handsome British stranger, who also happens to be working undercover for her father.

The Falklands Play is a dramatic account of the political events leading up to, and including, the 1982 Falklands War. The play was written by Ian Curteis, an experienced writer who had started his television career in drama, but had increasingly come to specialise in dramatic reconstructions of history. It was originally commissioned by the BBC in 1983, for production and broadcast in 1986, but was subsequently shelved by Controller of BBC One Michael Grade due to its alleged pro-Margaret Thatcher stance and jingoistic tone. This prompted a press furore over media bias and censorship.The play was not staged until 2002, when it was broadcast in separate adaptations on BBC Television and Radio.

The spoiled rotten and utterly unlikable rich kid George Amberson becomes horrified when his recently widowed mother rekindles her relationship with the wealthy Eugene Morgan, who she left decades earlier in order to marry George's father. As George struggles to sabotage his mother's new romance, he must deal with his own romantic feelings for Morgan's daughter and the consequences of his meddling as his once great family falls into ruin due to his machinations...

On the day of his retirement, a veteran CIA agent learns that his former protégé has been arrested in China, is sentenced to die the next morning in Beijing, and that the CIA is considering letting that happen to avoid an international scandal.

Workaholic reporter, Jack Elgin takes his family on a working trip to India, but their aircraft is hijacked in Cyprus by a previously-unknown terrorist movement, and his wife and daughter are among the slaughtered. With western governments suppressing key facts and unwilling to go after the terrorists, Jack uses his contacts and snooping skill to seek the truth himself.

One of the most spectacular and renowned conductors of the 1930s, Wilhelm Furtwangler's reputation rivaled that of Toscanini's. After the war, he was investigated as part of the Allies' de-Nazification programme. In the bombed-out Berlin of the immediate post-war period, the Allies slowly bring law and order to bear on an occupied Germany. An American major is given the Furtwangler file, and is told to find everything he can and to prosecute the man ruthlessly. Tough and hard-nosed, Major Steve Arnold sets out to investigate a world of which he knows nothing.

This unauthorized retrospective and making of features interviews with cast members from the original Star Wars trilogy reflecting on their experience making the films and the cultural phenomenon that ensued after the films release.

The story of the Opium War between China, in the waning days of the Qing Dynasty, and the British Empire, in the 1830s, and the subsequent takeover of Hong Kong by Britain; through the eyes of the key figures, fiercely nationalistic Lin Zexu, and opportunistic British naval diplomat Charles Elliot.

Two young children are brought to Janet Hinton, a social worker in the Scottish Highlands. When both she and an independent expert become convinced that the children are part of a ritual child abuse network, the small community is thrown into disarray.

When Ethan Hunt, the leader of a crack espionage team whose perilous operation has gone awry with no explanation, discovers that a mole has penetrated the CIA, he's surprised to learn that he's the No. 1 suspect. To clear his name, Hunt now must ferret out the real double agent and, in the process, even the score.

Fictional account of what might have happened if Hitler had won the war. It is now the 1960s and Germany's war crimes have so far been kept a secret. Hitler wants to talk peace with the US president. An American journalist and a German homicide cop stumble into a plot to destroy all evidence of the genocide.

The US Army has decided to modernize its cavalry, so Colonel James E. Devers is ordered by a general to convert a horse unit to motorcycles, but his men are easily outclassed as riders by a pack of rowdies, especially Grady Westfall; when he is arrested risking a long jail term, he's given one way out: enlisting as Corporal, assigned as driving instructor. Unit commander Captain Jack Hassler reviles his unorthodox boyish methods as undermining discipline and tradition, not to mention flirting with the Colonels daughter Beryl Ann, but he's needed, especially when his unit is deployed on a secret mission in Spain.

An experimental submarine with a very experienced crew, the "Siren II" is sent to find out what happened to the "Siren I" after it mysteriously disappeared in a submarine rift. Things go awry when they begin to find things that shouldn't be there...

Adaptation from a novel by Frederick Forsyth.

Aspiring young novelist Tony Zonis (Alexis Denisof) wants to write the next great suspense thriller, so he decides to study the work of master crime writer, Willard Hope (Christopher Lee). Together, they pick through random newspaper stories, looking for the unusual event that will make a good thriller. What they find is murder. A government cover-up... an international scandal... and the bodies are just beginning to fall into place. Now Tony isn't just writing the next best-seller... he's writing his own obituary.

Batman must face his most ruthless nemesis when a deformed madman calling himself "The Joker" seizes control of Gotham's criminal underworld.

Political drama about the Gorbachev-Reagan summit at Reykjavik

A truck driver builds a special, eight-ton monster truck to help get revenge against the rednecks who killed his family.

Marine officer Rob Cutter and his wife Barbara have a son named Johnny. Rob discovers that two newly delivered helicopters in his squadron have crashed because a defective part, a C-ring, has been made of a weaker, less expensive alloy. Before Rob can go public with this, Rob is killed on the orders of corrupt General Howard, who did not want Rob to go public with the defective part. Howard believes that Barbara, who is also a marine, now has the part, so Howard and his henchmen set out to kill Barbara and Johnny and get the part, but Howard is underestimating what Barbara is willing to do to protect Johnny.

A famed mystery writer and her doctor ex-lover solve her daughter-in-law's murder.

The life of King Henry the Fifth.

The assassination of the would be ruler of Rome at the hands of Brutus and company has tragic consequences for Brutus and the republic.

In September 1944, a Wehrmacht officer tried to hand over his unit.

Learn the incredible behind-the-scenes story of how the original Star Wars movie was brought to the big screen in this fascinating documentary hosted by C-3PO and R2-D2 which includes interviews with George Lucas and appearances by Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher.

Russian and British submarines with nuclear missiles on board both vanish from sight without a trace. England and Russia both blame each other as James Bond tries to solve the riddle of the disappearing ships. But the KGB also has an agent on the case.

Operation Market Garden, September 1944. The Allies attempt to capture several strategically important bridges in the Netherlands in the hope of breaking the German lines.

Princess Leia is captured and held hostage by the evil Imperial forces in their effort to take over the galactic Empire. Venturesome Luke Skywalker and dashing captain Han Solo team together with the loveable robot duo R2-D2 and C-3PO to rescue the beautiful princess and restore peace and justice in the Empire.

The doomed love story between Marguerite Gautier, a French courtesan frequented by high-class gentlemen, who is suffering from tuberculosis, and a young gentleman Armand Duval who's new in town.

Handsomely-mounted historical epic concerns the birth of the Islamic faith and the story of the prophet Mohammed.

A young girl on a train finds out that her companion is a serial killer.

Adaptation of Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, a historical drama that attempts to bring an epic visual style to the Bard's original stage play. The story concerns Marc Antony's attempts to rule Rome while maintaining a relationship with the queen of Egypt (Hildegarde Neil), which began while Antony was still married. Now he is being forced to marry the sister of his Roman co-leader, and soon the conflict leads to war.

The story of a U.S. deserter who comes in search of English sanctuary and turns out to be something of a negative cause, both for those who attempt to help him directly and those who like to use him politically.

A college professor lectures on the recently published Kinsey Report, as Americans are stunned by the shocking sexual truths revealed by the statistics. Five audience members reflect on their own sex lives, which flesh out the research with real life experience. A young couple ponder the repercussions of pre-marital sex. Returning home from overseas, a man learns that his neglected wife has been unfaithful. Anguish follows a divorcee's romantic fling. Having had sex with no one but his wife in his entire life, a man attempts to sow some belated wild oats. A young girl considering abortion is horrified by the filthy illegal back-door 'clinics' that are her only option.