Richard Burton
The most talked about couple of the 1960's: Elizabeth Taylor & Richard Burton, made dozens of films together, and even walked down the aisle, and, out the divorce court twice! This is the tale of this legendary couple.
Self (Archive Footage)
Julie Andrews starred in Hollywood productions that have become iconic movies, winning an Oscar for her performance as Mary Poppins, a symbol of the magic of musicals from the 1960s. And yet, behind the squeaky-clean image hides a much more tortuous career, with its moments of glory and tough times, all of which explain the longevity of a story that is still being written.
Self (archive footage)
We are drowning in celebrity culture and certainly no tabloid topic has been as big as Paris Hilton. Her incarceration and subsequent release, then re-incarceration and her ultimate release once again-left us submerged knee-deep in the twists and turns of her life. Famous for doing nothing, she's the ultimate manifestation of our obsession with celebrity culture and the massive profits that it wields. As long as we are willing to watch and read, who can resist feeding our habit?
George Herbert, The Journalist (archive sound)
In 1978 Jeff Wayne composed and produced one of the most groundbreaking and best-selling musical works of all time. In 2006, after much anticipation, Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of The Worlds was brought to the stage for the first time, playing to sold-out arenas. This version filmed at Wembley Arena (UK) on 25th April 2006.
Himself (archive material)
Broadway: The Golden Age is the most important, ambitious and comprehensive film ever made about America's most celebrated indigenous art form. Award-winning filmmaker Rick McKay filmed over 100 of the greatest stars ever to work on Broadway or in Hollywood. He soon learned that great films can be restored, fine literature can be kept in print - but historic Broadway performances of the past are the most endangered. They leave only memories that, while more vivid, are more difficult to preserve. In their own words — and not a moment too soon — Broadway: The Golden Age tells the stories of our theatrical legends, how they came to New York, and how they created this legendary century in American theatre. This is the largest cast of legends ever in one film.
Self (archive footage)
Documentary about the making of 20th Century Fox's 1963 film "Cleopatra," then the most expensive film of all time.
Narrator (Voice)
A poet's tale of a day in the lives of the villagers of a Welsh fishing town of Llareggub.
Self (archive footage)
Biography of risk-taker and raconteur John Huston from his childhood to become one of the most highly respected filmmakers in the world.
Self (Archive Footage)
Tony Palmer's award-winning feature-length documentary profile of Richard Burton.
Self (archive footage)
Stars celebrate Bob Hope's 50 years with NBC.
Richard Burton
Documentary examination of the role of Hamlet, in which ten prominent actors who have played the part discuss Hamlet's personality, Shakespeare's play, and the enduring popular fascination it has inspired. The actors interviewed are Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, Richard Burton, Nicol Williamson, Ben Kingsley, Jean Louis Barrault, Vittorio Gassman, Maximilian Schell, Innocenti Smoktunovsky, and Mandy Patinkin. Includes excerpts from various film and television versions of Hamlet, featuring these actors and others.
O'Brien
George Orwell's novel of a totalitarian future society in which a man whose daily work is rewriting history tries to rebel by falling in love.
Self
A Celebration of the great life of Frank Sinatra with song, dance, and many famous guests.
White Knight
From the elaborate Broadway revival of the 1932 Eva Le Gallienne/Florida Friebus production comes a whimsical retelling of the Lewis Carroll classic.
Narrator
The story of Leonardo da Vinci: his life, his thoughts, his times, his art and inventions and the individuals who had an influence on his life.
Narrator
The story of the three year expedition led by British explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes, which ended in August 1982, and which was man's first and only land and sea voyage around the world crossing both poles, without leaving the Earth's surface.
King Mark of Cornwall
Romantic tragedy, the story of Tristan and Isolde.
Ashley St. Clair
A 60-year-old artist shares a secret, platonic romance with a 16-year-old girl.
Sergeant Steiner
Starting in late May 1944, during the German retreat on the Eastern Front, Captain Stransky (Helmut Griem) orders Sergeant Steiner (Richard Burton) to blow up a railway tunnel to prevent Russian forces from using it. Steiner's platoon fails in its mission by coming up against a Russian tank. Steiner then takes a furlough to Paris just as the Allies launch their invasion of Normandy.
Col. Allen Faulkner
A British multinational company seeks to overthrow a vicious dictator in central Africa. It hires a band of (largely aged) mercenaries in London and sends them in to save the virtuous but imprisoned opposition leader who is also critically ill and due for execution. Just when the team has performed a perfect rescue, the multinational does a deal with the vicious dictator leaving the mercenary band to escape under their own steam and exact revenge.
Father Goddard
At a Catholic boys' school, domineering disciplinarian Father Goddard rules over his pupils with an iron hand. When one of his teenage charges confesses to murder, the dogmatic but deeply repressed Goddard finds his faith challenged and his life spiralling dangerously out of control.
John Morlar
A French detective in London reconstructs the life of a man lying in hospital with severe injuries with the help of journals and a psychiatrist. He realises that the man had powerful telekinetic abilities.
Himself
Promotional short film about the making of the 1978 film The Wild Geese.
Martin Dysart
A psychiatrist, Martin Dysart, investigates the savage blinding of six horses with a metal spike in a stable in Hampshire, England. The atrocity was committed by an unassuming seventeen-year-old stable boy named Alan Strang, the only son of an opinionated but inwardly-timid father and a genteel, religious mother. As Dysart exposes the truths behind the boy's demons, he finds himself face-to-face with his own.
Father Philip Lamont
Bizarre nightmares plague Regan MacNeil four years after her possession and exorcism. Has the demon returned? And if so, can the combined faith and knowledge of a Vatican investigator and a hypnotic research specialist free her from its grasp?
Self
CBS honors Lucille Ball with this celebration of her three CBS series: I Love Lucy, The Lucy Show and Here's Lucy.
Malcolm Lowry (voice)
This feature-length Oscar®-nominated documentary focuses on Malcolm Lowry, author of one of the major novels of the 20th century, Under the Volcano. But while Lowry fought a winning battle with words, he lost his battle with alcohol. Shot on location in four countries, the film combines photographs, readings by Richard Burton from the novel and interviews with the people who loved and hated Lowry, to create a vivid portrait of the man.
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill's life in the years leading up to World War II.
Alec Harvey
Two strangers, both married to others, meet in a railway station and soon find themselves in a brief but intense affair.
Breck Stancill
A small southern town has just been rocked by a tragedy: a young woman has been violently raped. The white town fathers immediately declare that the attacker had to be black, and place the blame on Garth, a young black man. Assuming that the men in white sheets aren't intent on holding a fair and impartial trial, Garth takes to the woods as the Klansmen lynching party hunts him down.
Cesare Braggi
The charming Adriana gets sick after her husband's death. Her brother-in-law takes her on a journey to meet a doctor, while love overwhelms them.
SS-Obersturmbannführer Herbert Kappler
In the Nazi occupied city of Rome, an assault on an SS brigade draws retaliation from the military governship. "Massacre in Rome" is the true story of how this partisan attack led to the mass execution of Italian nationals under the orders of SS-Lieutenant Colonel Kappler.
Josip Broz Tito
The headquarters of the Marshal Tito's Liberation Army are surrounded by Axis forces. The Partisans have no choice but to fight their way out of the encirclement and face the enemy on the plains of Sutjeska.
Baron von Sepper
Baron von Sepper is an Austrian aristocrat noted for his blue-toned beard, and his appetite for beautiful wives. His latest spouse, an American beauty named Anne, discovers a vault in his castle that's filled with the frozen bodies of several beautiful women.
Hammersmith
The Faust legend retold (loosely) and applied to a mentally disturbed patient in a hospital run by a doctor of dubious sanity himself. The patient offers the innocent orderly vast riches if he'll help him escape.
Leon Trotsky
A Stalinist assassin tracks exiled revolutionary Leon Trotsky to Mexico in 1940.
First Man
The delightful if peculiar story of a day in the life of a small, Welsh fishing village called "Llareggub" in which we meet a host of curious characters (and ghosts) through the 'eyes' of Blind Captain Cat.
Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
A dog tries to become a canine star with the help of Zsa Zsa Gabor.
Vic Dakin
In 1970s London, Scotland Yard orchestrates the downfall of mob boss Vic Dakin after he crosses the line by blackmailing Members of Parliament.
Capt. Alex Foster
Captain Foster plans on raiding German-occupied Tobruk with hand- picked commandos, but a mixup leaves him with a medical unit led by a Quaker conscientious objector.
King Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England discards his wife, Katharine of Aragon, who has failed to produce a male heir, in favor of the young and beautiful Anne Boleyn.
Harry Leeds
An aging gay couple owns a barber shop in the East End of London. One of them is a part-time actor about to go on trial for propositioning a police officer. The action takes place over the course of one night as they discuss their loving but often volatile past together and possible future without each other.
Sir Edward More (scenes deleted)
Swinging London in the 1960's. Deals with the affection of a middle-aged man for a very young woman, resulting in a mutually parasitic relationship.
Narrator - Verse Spoken
Thirty distinguished astronomers are visited at their observatories throughout the world in this comprehensive report of astronomical theories, research, and discoveries.
MacPhisto
A high school girl encounters a variety of kookie characters and humorous sexual situations while searching for the meaning of life.
Maj. Smith
World War II is raging, and an American general has been captured and is being held hostage in the Schloss Adler, a Bavarian castle that's nearly impossible to breach. It's up to a group of skilled Allied soldiers to liberate the general before it's too late.
A behind-the-scenes look at the difficulties of shooting a movie on location in the Austrian Alps.
Chris Flanders
Explores the confrontation between the woman who has everything, including emptiness, and a penniless poet who has nothing but the ability to fill a wealthy woman's needs.
Brown
American and British tourists get caught up in political unrest in Haiti.
Director
Faustus is a scholar at the University of Wittenberg when he earns his doctorate degree. His insatiable appetite for knowledge and power leads him to employ necromancy to conjure Mephistopheles out of hell. He bargains away his soul to Lucifer in exchange for living 24 years during which Mephistopheles will be his slave. Faustus signs the pact in his own blood and Mephistopheles reveals the works of the devil to Faustus.
Doctor Faustus
Faustus is a scholar at the University of Wittenberg when he earns his doctorate degree. His insatiable appetite for knowledge and power leads him to employ necromancy to conjure Mephistopheles out of hell. He bargains away his soul to Lucifer in exchange for living 24 years during which Mephistopheles will be his slave. Faustus signs the pact in his own blood and Mephistopheles reveals the works of the devil to Faustus.
Self (uncredited)
Behind the scenes short documentary about the cast and crew during the filming of The Comedians.
Interviewee
Richard Burton is interviewed by film critic Kenneth Tynan
Producer
Italy, 16th century. Petruchio, a choleric, lying and poor rural landowner from Verona, arrives in Padua in search of fortune and a wife, while Baptista, a wealthy merchant, announces that he will not allow Bianca, his youngest daughter, to marry until the temperamental and unruly Katherina, his eldest daughter, does.
Petruchio
Italy, 16th century. Petruchio, a choleric, lying and poor rural landowner from Verona, arrives in Padua in search of fortune and a wife, while Baptista, a wealthy merchant, announces that he will not allow Bianca, his youngest daughter, to marry until the temperamental and unruly Katherina, his eldest daughter, does.
Himself - Narrator
A dramatic, solemn and refined work, "Per Firenze" spread throughout the world the cry for help that was rising in those hours from the city of Dante and Brunelleschi, giving rise to one of the greatest phenomena of solidarity that has gone down in history under the name of the "mud angels."
George
A history professor and his wife entertain a young couple who are new to the university's faculty. As the drinks flow, secrets come to light, and the middle-aged couple unload onto their guests the full force of the bitterness, dysfunction, and animosity that defines their marriage.
Alec Leamas
British agent Alec Leamas refuses to come in from the Cold War during the 1960s, choosing to face another mission, which may prove to be his final one.
Edward Hewitt
A free-spirited single mother forms a connection with the wedded headmaster of an Episcopalian boarding school in Monterey, California.
Man In Strip Club
A playboy who refuses to give up his hedonistic lifestyle to settle down and marry his true love seeks help from a demented psychoanalyst who is having romantic problems of his own.
Self / Narrator
This MGM short film narrated by Richard Burton promotes its upcoming major release "The Sandpiper" (1965), starring Burton and his then wife Elizabeth Taylor. Panoramic shots of the ocean, the seashore, and the desert segue into the artistic community with various of its well-known artists at work and play. It all leads to clips from the film being made.
Self
Promotional short for the film "The Sandpiper".
Hamlet
A stage production of Hamlet filmed at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre in New York.
Rev. Dr. T. Lawrence Shannon
A defrocked Episcopal clergyman leads a bus-load of middle-aged Baptist women on a tour of the Mexican coast and comes to terms with the failure haunting his life.
Self
Behind the scenes documentary of the filming of Tennessee Williams' The Night of the Iguana.
Becket / Thomas Becket
King Henry II of England has trouble with the Church. When the Archbishop of Canterbury dies, he has a brilliant idea. Rather than appoint another pious cleric loyal to Rome and the Church, he will appoint his old drinking and wenching buddy, Thomas Becket, technically a deacon of the church, to the post. Unfortunately, Becket takes the job seriously and provides abler opposition to Henry.
Narration spoken
In 1879, during the Anglo-Zulu War, man-of-the-people Lt. Chard and snooty Lt. Bromhead are in charge of defending the isolated and vastly outnumbered Natal outpost of Rorke's Drift from tribal hordes.
Associate Producer
Aston, a quiet, reserved man, lives alone in a top-floor cluttered room of a small abandoned house in a poor London district. He befriends and takes in Mac Davies, an old derelict who has been fired from a menial job in a café. In time Aston offers him a job as caretaker of the house. Aston's brother, Mick - a taunting, quasi-sadist - harasses the derelict when his brother is away, countermanding his orders...
Paul Andros
Wealthy passengers fogged in at London's Heathrow Airport fight to survive a variety of personal trials.
Marcus Antonius
Determined to hold on to the throne, Cleopatra seduces the Roman emperor Julius Caesar. When Caesar is murdered, she redirects her attentions to his general, Marc Antony, who vows to take power—but Caesar’s successor has other plans.
Flying Officer David Campbell
The retelling of June 6, 1944, from the perspectives of the Germans, US, British, Canadians, and the Free French. Marshall Erwin Rommel, touring the defenses being established as part of the Reich's Atlantic Wall, notes to his officers that when the Allied invasion comes they must be stopped on the beach. "For the Allies as well as the Germans, it will be the longest day"
Himself
A musical special celebrating the fruitful collaboration of Broadway lyricist/librettist Alan Jay Lerner and composer Frederick Loewe. Stars from the current Broadway hit "Camelot" and from past triumphs such as "My Fair Lady," and the film "Gigi" perform the romantic, sophisticated songs of Lerner and Loewe.
An atmospheric tribute to the genius of Welsh poet and dramatist Dylan Thomas, using many of the windswept locations where Thomas himself grew up and found his inspiration. The film is hosted/presented by Richard Burton, Thomas's friend, who narrates the story and appears from time to time amidst the Welsh landscape. Burton had already appeared in Douglas Cleverdon's acclaimed BBC radio dramatization of Thomas's 'play for voices' Under Milk Wood in the 1950s and, in the early Seventies, would appear in director Andrew Sinclair's film version as First Voice. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation and National Screen and Sound Archive of Wales in 2000.
A dramatized account of a Victorian cause célèbre, written by John Osborne and concerning the true story of the last person in England to be tried for blasphemy. Richard Burton plays John George Holyoake, a social reformer who goes on trial for speaking in public about his atheist views. Rachel Roberts plays his wife, and the programme is introduced by Face to Face inquisitor John Freeman.
Dr. Guy Montford
A young doctor returns to his Massachusetts home town at the request of a terminally ill old friend.
Caliban
Prospero, the deposed Duke of Milan, who lives in exile on a remote island as a sorcerer, uses his powers to shipwreck his usurper brother on the island.
A TV film made as part of The Buick-Electra Playhouse.
Zeb Kennedy
Alaska: America's last great wilderness frontier. A land of primitive grandeur, of glaciers, mountains and ice-fields. And of ambitious cannery tycoon Zeb "Czar" Kennedy (Richard Burton) and rugged activist leader Thor Storm (Robert Ryan), two rough-hewn men whose bitter 40-year rivalry mirrored their powerful land's struggle for statehood.
Narrator
Richard Burton narrates this stunning film of two Polish soldiers struggling to make a living from a derelict farm in Carmarthenshire.
Jimmy Porter
A disillusioned, angry university graduate comes to terms with his grudge against middle-class life and values.
Narrator (voice)
Collaborative documentary (credited to a committee rather than to individual filmmakers) detailing the CND march from London to Aldermaston at Easter 1958.
Heathcliff
Mistreated foundling Heathcliff and his stepsister Catherine fall in love, but when she marries a wealthy man, he becomes obsessed with getting revenge, even well into the next generation.
Biscuit
In 1942, a cargo ship jammed with British evacuees from Singapore is sunk by a Japanese sub. A small lifeboat carries a beautiful woman, an army officer, a bigoted administrator, and a black seaman. Only the seaman knows the woman is a nun. The men reveal their true selves under the hardships of survival. Told in a too-long flashback frame.
Capt. Leith
During the second world war, two British officers, Brand and Leith, who have never seen combat are assigned a vital mission. Their relationship and the operation are complicated by the arrival of Brand's wife, who had a tryst with Leith years earlier.
Alexander
He was a fierce military commander who led huge armies into battle without a single defeat; a magnificent warrior who many believed was part god - this was Alexander the Great (Richard Burton), the legendary Greek hero hailed by his countrymen as "The King of Kings". Born in 356 B.C. into a turbulent world of political unrest, educated by Aristotle (Barry Jones) and chosen to lead his people in the grand tradition of his powerful father (Fredric March), this glamorous world conqueror rose above all conflict to unite the continents of Europe and Asia to become one of the most celebrated rulers of all time! Written, produced and directed by Oscar - winner Robert Rossen and featuring the extraordinary Claire Bloom and a remarkable cast of thousands, this stunning portrait of one of history's most fascinating figures is colossal entertainment and an amazing spectacle.
Dr. Major Rama Safti
India. The spoilt and stubborn Edwina Esketh, comes to a small town with her husband. She falls in love with an indian doctor, Dr. Safti. She also meets an old friend of hers, the alcoholic Tom Ransome. An awful earthquake is followed by days of rain.
Edwin Booth
Prince of Players is a biographical film about the 19th century American actor Edwin Booth.
Narrator (voice)
Won the Academy Award for the Best Documentary Short of 1954. The subject deals with the children at The Royal School for the Deaf in Margate, Kent. The hearing-handicapped children are shown painstakingly learning what words are through exercises and games, practicing lip-reading and finally speech. Richard Burton's calm and sometimes-poetic narration adds to the heartwarming cheerfulness and courage of the children.
Marcellus Gallio
Marcellus is a tribune in the time of Christ. He is in charge of the group that is assigned to crucify Jesus. Drunk, he wins Jesus' homespun robe after the crucifixion. He is tormented by nightmares and delusions after the event. Hoping to find a way to live with what he has done, and still not believing in Jesus, he returns to Palestine to try and learn what he can of the man he killed.
Captain "Tammy" MacRoberts
In North Africa, German Field Marshal Rommel and his troops have successfully fended off British forces, and now intend to take Tobruk, an important port city. A ramshackle group of Australian reinforcements sent to combat the Germans is put under the command of British Captain MacRoberts. The unruly Aussies immediately clash with MacRoberts, a gruff, strict disciplinarian, however this unorthodox team must band together to protect Tobruk from the German forces.
Philip Ashley
A young man plots revenge against the woman he believes murdered his cousin, but his plans are shaken when he comes face to face with the enigmatic beauty.
Robert 'Bob' Hammond
Efforts to move Britain into the modern age don't sit well with the people of the small village of Anderia Marsh, who have claimed a right (going back to Henry III) to evade government-imposed import duties and taxes. And when the government decides to curb this right, the whole village quietly rises up in a comical rebellion. After their vessel runs aground during a storm and is impounded by the British authorities, local smugglers must find a way of disposing of their contraband brandy cargo before it's discovered by the Customs Officers.
Nick Chamerd
This is a British drama film from 1950 about a young woman in London in WW2 with amnesia.
Ben Satterthwaite
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.
Paddy
A humane prison governor deals with a variety of different prisoners, including a charming murderer.
Gareth
An old woman fights a group of industrialists who are planning to build a dam and flood the valley where she grew up.
