Movie critic Ian Nathan goes in search of the cinematically sublime and explores the ingredients that went into making a classic. With each episode devoted to a single film, their story will be told with detail, affection, looking for the truth behind the myth, and all the trials and triumphs that went into forging the classic.
No overview available.
6 episodes
In this opening episode, movie critic Ian Nathan examines the qualities that made this 1949 film noir starring Orson Welles an enduring classic.
Runtime: 45 minMovie critic Ian Nathan examines the qualities that made this 1955 black comedy - starring Alec Guinness and Peter Sellers - a classic.
Runtime: 44 minMovie critic Ian Nathan examines the qualities that made this 1948 gangster film noir starring Richard Attenborough, an enduring British classic.
Runtime: 44 minMovie critic Ian Nathan examines the qualities that made this 1967 romantic comedy-drama starring Dustin Hoffman an all-time classic.
Runtime: 44 minMovie critic Ian Nathan examines the qualities that made this 1985 epic action drama, directed and co-written by Akira Kurosawa, an enduring classic.
Runtime: 40 minMovie critic Ian Nathan examines what helped to make James Cameron's 1991 sci-fi-action sequel, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton, so critically-acclaimed within the genre.
Runtime: 44 minNo overview available.
6 episodes
Ian Nathan returns to cast his eye over more cinematic masterpieces, beginning with David Lean's 1945 romantic tragedy starring Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard.
Runtime: 46 minIan Nathan examines Alexander Mackendrick's 1949 Ealing comedy, in which Scottish islanders try to salvage 50,000 cases of whisky from a shipwreck.
Runtime: 44 minIan Nathan examines Mel Brooks' classic 1968 comedy, which stars Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder as two men who set out to make a Broadway flop.
Runtime: 45 minIan Nathan examines the Boulting brothers' 1959 comedy, a satire on British industrial life starring Ian Carmichael Peter Sellers, Richard Attenborough and Margaret Rutherford.
Runtime: 45 minIan Nathan examines the 1974 adaptation of the Agatha Christie mystery, featuring a stellar cast of train-bound suspects and Albert Finney as Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.
Runtime: 45 minIan Nathan examines Michael Cimino's 1978 Vietnam War drama, which starred Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, John Savage, John Cazale and Meryl Streep.
Runtime: 44 minNo overview available.
6 episodes
One of the greatest spy films ever made, The Ipcress Files begins with a kindap, a killing and a cup of coffee.
Runtime: 44 minKind Hearts and Coronets is one of a kind, a superb pitch-black comedy about gentle serial killing.
Runtime: 44 minThe Dam Busters begins in 1942, where a bespectacled man plays marbles with his children under a silver sky.
Runtime: 44 minFrom Charles Frend, this 1948 drama tells the story of Robert Falcon Scott’s failed attempt to be the first to reach the South Pole.
Runtime: 44 minAs Mike Hodges’ flamboyant science fiction epic and Queen’s iconic rock song declares, Flash Gordon will be the saviour of the universe.
Runtime: 44 minDirected by John Schlesinger in 1963, Billy Liar is one of the signature films of the British New Wave, the dynamic naturalism of the sixties.
Runtime: 44 min