H.F. Maltby

Classic British comedy following an accident-prone army Private, played by music hall legend Frank Randle in his final screen role, as he attempts to rescue a Corporal (played by icon Diana Dors) from the attentions of a predatory Sergeant-Major.

Opposing ends of a pantomime horse where the 'head' dates a society lady while the 'tail' is unhappily married.

The aging Caesar finds himself intrigued by the young Egyptian queen. Adapted by George Bernard Shaw from his own play.

Musical romantic comedy about an orphan and the son of a Colonel and his snooty wife, who refuses to give them her blessing.

A retired general helps out by sheltering some evacuees during WWII.

Three modern day pilgrims investigate a bizarre crime in a small town on the way to Canterbury.

A night watchman is being bludgeoned, as a safe is cracked open in the offices of the District Food Controller. A list of wartime foods to be rationed is stolen, and the police fear gangsters are planning to sell the foods on the black market. As the office charwoman, Old Mother Riley's fingerprints are all over the safe, and she becomes the police's number one suspect. To prove her innocence, Mother Riley turns detective, adopting various methods and disguises to track down the villains.

Two friends set about trying to run a restaurant and bringing a gang of black marketeers to justice during the Second World war.

Two teenage gang members are forced to be page boys at a hotel where a criminal gang are operating.

Home guardsman Albert is in love with Dolly, the daughter of commanding officer Diehard. In order to impress her, Albert tries to raise funds to buy a tank for the village.

Gert and Daisy accompany a crowd of Cockney children who are being evacuated to a stately home in the country.

Betty driver vehicle

A comedy film directed by Maclean Rogers

A comedy film directed by Maclean Rogers

A comedy film directed by Maclean Rogers

In pre-Second World War England, a leading film star and his wife attempt to recover a secret carburetor stolen by enemy agents. Based on a popular stage musical starring Hulbert and Courtneidge, a husband-and-wife team who had made a series of successful comedy films during the 1930s.

Robert Maine is torn between returning to the glamour of Hollywood and working with a small theatre company in England.

In this lurid melodrama, Tod Slaughter plays a villain who murders the wealthy Sir Percival Glyde in the gold fields of Australia and assumes his identity in order to inherit Glyde's estate in England. On arriving in England, "Sir Percival" schemes to marry an heiress for her money, and, with the connivance of the cunning Dr. Isidor Fosco, embarks on a killing spree of all who suspect him to be an imposter and would get in the way of his plans to stay Lord of the Manor.

A man inherits a nightclub that belonged to his brother but soon discovers that it is the headquarters for a dangerous criminal gang.

Mother Riley plays a nurse who was forced to volunteer for the Auxiliary Territorial Service. Mayhem ensues until she is able to prevent German spies from acquiring important documents.

When linguistics professor Henry Higgins boasts that he can pass off Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle as a princess with only six months' training, Colonel George Pickering takes him up on the bet. Eliza moves into Higgins's home and begins her rigorous training after the professor comes to a financial agreement with her dustman father, Alfred. But the plucky young woman is not the only one undergoing a transformation.

An American reporter takes over an assignment on English farm life. Owing to a mistake in identity things turn out rough but Valerie's charm and personality overcome the obstacles.

An American reporter takes over an assignment on English farm life. Owing to a mistake in identity things turn out rough but Valerie's charm and personality overcome the obstacles.

The impoverished Lord Cavender woos a phony heiress, Mabel Van Morgan, only to find that his secretary Mary, whom he really loves, is a genuine heiress. His Lordship does quickly and truly regret.

The impoverished Lord Cavender woos a phony heiress, Mabel Van Morgan, only to find that his secretary Mary, whom he really loves, is a genuine heiress. His Lordship does quickly and truly regret.

Steven Sims is a diamond merchant who bullies his kindly hard-working clerk and disappoints his expectations when he takes into partnership an aristocratic ne'er-do-well.

Steven Sims is a diamond merchant who bullies his kindly hard-working clerk and disappoints his expectations when he takes into partnership an aristocratic ne'er-do-well.

Adam McAdam is an old, dour sheepherder whose life is devoted to his faithful dog, the whiskey bottle and his daughter, Jeannie. And a conflict that arises when the other sheep-men of the district try every means within their power to have his dog, accused of being a sheep-killer, destroyed.

A chorus girl is mistaken for a millionaire's girlfriend.

Robert Tisdall finds on the beach the corpse of a woman he knew. Others wrongly conclude that he is the murderer. Fleeing, he desperately attempts to prove that he is not the killer. A young woman becomes embroiled in the effort.

A man is accused of a series of murders that were actually committed by a crazed killer called "The Tiger." He must prove his innocence and catch the murderer.

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.

After the Local council he works for decides to replace its horse-drawn services with motor vehicles, one of the drivers spends his savings to buy the horse. Together they search the countryside looking for work, and meeting an assorted group of characters on the way.

About a businessman (H.F.Maltby) who borrows his wife's pearls to cover a business loan, only for the pearls to then go missing.

An evil prison administrator cruelly abuses the inmates at his prison, until one day the tables are turned.

Hyman Goldberger, the president of film studio Super-Colossal Pictures, is in trouble--his major backer is threatening to stop financing his pictures. He finds a group of six wealthy individuals who may want to become investors in the studio if his disgruntled backer pulls out. Unfortunately, his bumbling runner Albert picks that day to invite six of his street musician friends to be in the film that is currently shooting at the studio, and Hyman mistakes them for the potential investors. Complications ensue.

In this he's on the dole, hungry and ready to do any job but quickly light-heartedly scams his way into society and a highly regarded position at a bank next to the beleaguered Robertson Hare. Here he invents a fraudulent business plan (Merrivale - you remember it surely?), the manager and chairman and another finance company are suck(er)ed in and it all snowballs from there. With of course a love interest as a dynamo.

An opera singer pretends to be poor in order to romantically win over a composer.

A bus conductor and his driver manage to round up a gang of criminals.

A bus conductor and his driver manage to round up a gang of criminals.

A woman prevents a popular stage performer getting arrested for drunk driving, though has to pretend to be a rich benefactor when she next meets him.

A woman prevents a popular stage performer getting arrested for drunk driving, though has to pretend to be a rich benefactor when she next meets him.

The story, starring Constance Bennett and Douglass Montgomery, involves a Canadian POW being hidden by a German citizen during World War I.

Will Hay plays the pennyless, bungling solicitor Benjamin Stubbins, who arrives at his office to find his insolent office boy (Graham Moffatt) with his feet up on the desk, reading a wild west magazine, which Hay confiscates so that he can read it later. Stubbins later takes a job from a group of Americans who claim they want him to track down some ancestors of theirs in Scotland. In reality however they want to use his office so they can rob a safe in the room immediately below his office. Stubbins takes the job (which is designed to keep him out of the office). In the end Stubbins realises his mistake and at a Christmas Eve fancy dress party he informs a group of carol singing policeman about the Americans nefarious activities

Calling the Tune offers a fascinating look at the fledgeling gramophone industry as it tries to solve the problems of reliable recording and production methods. 'I predict that the gramophone will be the democratic entertainment of the future' states unscrupulous record label boss Mr Gordon (Sam Livesey), who finally gets his comeuppance after one dirty trick too far against his rivals. If the film's love story is perfunctory, the real interest comes with watching performers of the day, from Henry Wood and his orchestra to George Robey and Charles 'the laughing policeman' Penrose laying down their recordings direct to record. And something very like a prototype laser disc makes a crucial appearance too.

A young business man (James Mason) is being duped by business swindlers but his gaol bird father is determined to save him.

The film begins in a BBC studio with the 100th edition of "In Town Tonight". Flotsam and Jetsom open with a "topical number". Then there is an interview with a distinguished actor, which dissolves into a performance of one of his famous melodramas about a wicked moneylender etc.

It is England in the 1830s. London's dockside is teeming with ships and sailors who have made their fortune in foreign lands. Sweeney Todd, a Fleet Street barber, awaits the arrival of men whose first port of call is for a good, close shave. For most it will be the last time they are seen alive. Using a specially designed barber's chair, Sweeney Todd despatches his victims to the cellar below, where he robs them of their new found fortunes and chops their remains into small pieces. Meanwhile, Mrs Lovett is enjoying a roaring trade for her popular penny meat pies.

A family butler tries to find the missing heir to a title.

Matronly great aunt Emily went off to Africa and left behind her wanna be snobbish family. Ten years later, upon her death, the greedy family members awaits the reading of the will. Ready to celebrate their fortunes the family gathers the evening before with a big party. A great assortment of characters, comic ones, are all expecting to get their share of the inheritance.

A lawyer's love for a young girl causes him to defend the man he thinks to be her lover. During the trial the lawyer finds out that the man is his own son.

A Yorkshire mill owner retires and leaves control to his nephew, who promptly gets married.

A Yorkshire mill owner retires and leaves control to his nephew, who promptly gets married.

The heir to a London department store must learn the business, but he must start off by working his way through the various menial jobs incognito first. However, a crooked manager has arranged, for a cracksman, just out of gaol, to join the staff. Each is mistaken for the other.

The boyfriend of an admiral's daughter poses as a detective in order to hunt missing emerald.

A confirmed bachelor takes pity on a young woman and takes her to London.

The Duke of Bridgewater sends for the heir he's never seen. His heir is Patricia, and the Duke is a woman-hater, so Patricia disguises herself as a boy.

British comedy. It was released in the United States the following year under the alternative title Trouble Ahead.

Two Americans in England--a wealthy playboy and an actress--join forces to stop international spies.

Two ship's cooks get lost in the desert and unwittingly enroll in the Foreign Legion!

A north-country chimney sweep standing for Parliament is opposed by a local bigwig. His campaign is imperiled when his artist son, Tony, falls in love with a girl who has reason to hope that the bigwig will be elected.

George Smith, a mild-mannered clerk with a crush on his boss's daughter, is led astray by an old friend of his father. A midday sojourn to a public bar results in him insulting his boss, getting sacked and enlisting in the Navy. Will he still remain a feeble second-best, or will active service make a man of him?

In this romantic comedy, the king of Ruritania marries an impoverished commoner after he is exiled. Trouble shows up when the king must return to his country and marry an heiress. Fortunately, his first bride has fallen for an army officer and is happy to have her royal marriage annulled.

A farce based on Arthur Wing Pinero's play 'The Magistrate' in which the son (John Mills) of a stern magistrate (Will Hay) visits a music hall against the wishes of his father. In true farcical style, the magistrate too ends up at the music hall, and before long all the characters are trying not to avoid each other... Mainly notable (a) because of its depiction of the music hall as seen by a generation which knew it intimately (b) because of its use of music hall acts of the time and (c) because it gave Will Hay his first film role.

On the eve of his own marriage, a man offers shelter to a runaway wife with whom he strikes up an unexpected bond.

A useless secretary and his private detective friend try to help an heiress from being swindled by her guardian.

A young heiress was wooed and won by a man whom she believed would make her happy. She told of her engagement to her uncle, who was also her guardian, and was pleased and surprised when he interposed no objection. The uncle was a crafty man, however. His accounts of the estate were in a very bad way and he feared that if his niece married and his books were examined he might land in the penitentiary. Consequently he was not anxious to see her a happy bride, but being crafty to know what the worst thing for him to do would be to object to the man she selected, so he pretended to be very fond of the suitor and praised him on all occasions.