Let's sing along:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F71cjp9KDWw

  Heavens, Ted!      "No Room at the Inn" (1948) and Freda Jackson superb as the harridan Mrs Voray.  I saw the pre-London production, as a schoolboy, in the immediate post-war era.   It became a subject of notoriety in its day and I think it had a long run at the Fortune Theatre, opposite Drury Lane Theatre.   I'd forgotten that the film was scripted by Dylan Thomas, though.    Another play, then film version, "Freida",  also made Daily Express headlines in the same era.    A British soldier married a fraulein in occupied Germany.     Shock and horror.    The publicity ran, "Would you take Freida" into your home?"  All this in tandem with the Nuremberg Nazi Trials.   However, it introduced audiences to a fine actress Mai Zetterling.

Sonia Dresdel was a very stylish woman and actress.   I met her when she was playing Christine Mannon in "Mourning Becomes Electra" at the Old Vic, in the late 50s, (early 60s) and it was the first time I'd seen Barbara Jefford.    At the time, Sonia was comforting a visiting young actress who was still upset after terrible reviews in a play oop north.       "Dearie, when you get off the train at King's X, nobody gives a f..k!"   A rich infectious laugh.      "The Fallen Idol" (1948) was classic Carol Reed and Sonia played a demented Belgravia harridan, rather than the east-end slag like Mrs Voray.    She also played another paranoid wife in  the West End and film version of "This Was A Woman" (1948).    She was cast as the mother of Oscar Wilde (Peter Finch version), "Trials of Oscar Wilde" in 1960 and her last film was probably "Lady Caroline Lamb" (1972).   She died in 1976.

I've just watched it, Stanley! 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3xa0h3cR3g&NR=1 Watch via p w's link instead - it's a better version!

But it does end abruptly at 2.14 - there may be a better version on YouTube somewhere.

MJ & pw  - thank you, so much.     Walter Minge!   I've laughed as much as ever but only cry when I see that the programme was recorded in 1974.  Is't e'en so?     This, of course, was prior to the era of videorecorders - almost 10 years in my case - but I did get it on VCR, during a repeat transmission, some years later.     By this time, the Walter Minge's were a dying breed but a few of them made a few bob, on the telly, or as supernumeraries at the N.T. or RSC.    I could name quite a few of these old-timers but this would be unkind as relatives may see this posting.    Perhaps I can make an exception in the case of Billy Russell whose final stage appearance was in Lindsay Anderson's production of David Storey's "The Contractor" which transferred from the Royal Court Theatre to the Fortune Theatre for a lengthy run, circa 1969/70.      Several decades earlier, Billy had toured the music hall circuits with his act, 'On Behalf of the Working Man'.     He could be quite cantankerous but what a remarkable performer.    He'd amble on-stage and get an immediate communication with an audience by under-playing.   "Anybody 'ere, seen a bit of old rope?" and, although I didn't join the production until half-way through the run, I used to stand in the wings, night after night, just to watch him work with his son, played by Bill Owen.    I often sat in his dressing room, listening to his anecdotes of life in the theatre, 50 years earlier.    He died in 1971 so a ripe character role in "The Contractor" was his farewell to the  boards.

Thank you for that wonderful post about Michael Powell and Foula, Stanley.

And I just loved this:

 Hi Pim
Some great posters there - Im always interested in David Lynch - have yet to see Mulholland Drive but i have heard of its steamy reputation - what was yr view of it

Have seen Downfall on video and thought very powerful portrayl of the last desperate days of the Reich - thought Bruno Ganz was very good as Hitler - thinking about it must very easy role to botch up being such a notorious figure.  - also saw Bruno Ganz in Herzogs Nosferatu - not a horror film so much as an atmospheric art film with Klaus Kinski chilling as the count !!

The Lumet film was the most recent film for me. Lately I'm too busy for visiting cinemas.

Hello offbeat.

Mulholland Drive is a fine film but to me, it wasn't as good as Lost Highway. Too many dwarfs and aliens, although the references to Sunset Boulevard were done in a very elegant way. But I don't like it when "solo sex"  is being used as a metaphor for loneliness. I watched the film in a Rotterdam cinema where the audience had to laugh about the most violent scenes. Not a very pleasant experience.

Nosferatu. Werner Herzog is a monster. He killed thousands of rats for the production of this picture. The man who provided the rats for this production, the Dutch writer and biologist Maarten 't Hart, still hates Herzorg for this. He published about it in Granta:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maarten_'t_Hart

Some scenes of Nosferatu were shot in the Dutch city of Schiedam, where I lived for a few years.

http://picasaweb.google.com/joezer96/MijnDiaS/photo#5129416595927943906

Maarten 't Hart was born in my hometown (Maassluis). I recently saw a film adaptation of his novel Het Woeden der Gehele Wereld. Probably the worst Dutch film ever made.