The ten greatest Green Teef films I ever saw...

My man New England scoffed the other day at the concept of the UK making a decent movie. And this made me remember. It made me remember a time when the UK was capable of making a movie that wasn't a complete piece of ****, featuring Hugh Grant being a ****, or some wizard with bad eyesight or some stupid ****ing thing. **** off.

Of course, it doesn't help that the British film industry has been in the doldrums since the late 1970s, without the ££££ to really produce stuff. That's why ****s like Richard Curtis can produce successful movies, cos they're capable of producing candyfloss shitfuckery for the foreign market, reality not important.

But it also makes you question what is a "British" movie. Take the Dark Knight films Fat Yanks love. Stars a Green Teef, written and directed by a Green Teef, at least 50% of the cast are Green Teefs putting on Fat Yank accents.... but it's made with $$$$.

But enough rambling, ****s. Here's my ten, in no particular order...

Brief Encounter (1945)
An objective choice here, cos this ain't gonna give anyone an erection. There's no car chases or explosions here, Fat Yanks, or Sylvester Stallone blowing **** up. All there is is a character study that goes on a bit, with beautiful direction.

One thing about films from this era of UK cinema is that the province of acting was only available to the upper/middle classes. Just as you watch Fat Yank films of the period and they all do that melodramatic style of acting before method took over, in UK films of the 40s they all talk in this clipped, posh way, which makes you think it's supposed to be funny when you watch it today. Take a look at the original Brighton Rock (1947) and there's a scene where a man gets his face slashed wide open with a razor blade. Violent for the time, though when he says "I say, you just perishing laced me, you dashed rotter!" it sounds almost like a parody.

These are good films, but you have to "buy in" to the mindset of these ****ers being from a different generation. Brief Encounter is about a woman thinking of an affair. But she says "my darling, I dashed thought of a pesky flirtation" or some such crap, rather than "I felt like having another bloke fuck me right in the ****."


Odd Man Out (1947)
Despite what I spoke about above, I don't recall this being of the same "old speak" ilk. It's a tale of a wounded IRA hitman on the run in England. Don't recall much about it offhand, but I do seem to recall a scene where he stares down at a bar table at spilt beer and sees hallucinations in the bubbles of beer. Nearly gave me an erection tbh.

On reflection, a lot of UK talent has always sought the more lucrative $$$, a wider market. You look at those Universal horror movies, or Chaplin. But we continue with this theme...

The Long Good Friday (1980)
In many ways this is the perfect "perhaps the last decent UK movie" ever made. Okay, it's an exaggeration, I saw two or three good Green Teef movies only this year, but from the 1980s on the money was running out, the British film industry was in total collapse and being supported on the back of sex comedies.

The Long Good Friday (its name a parody of old school detective movies of course) is a reflection of the times... a capitalist businessman trying to build a (criminal) empire in a time when Thatcher was shafting the **** out all UK industries. It not only works as a great gangster thriller in its own right, but it also exists as a sly commentary on the very nature of the world which was making it. And although Bob Hoskins phones in his performances these days, he's never been better than here.

[talip bin osman]

you better have the 39 steps and trainspotting in this list of yours annie...

or else...

just kidding mate...

Get Carter (1971)
Michael Caine has had all of his classic movies remade in Hollywood over the last few years - Alfie (1966) and The Italian Job (1969) might also make this list - and this one was made into a mediocre but passable Stallone vehicle a dozen years ago.

Forget the 2000 "remake", this is a bleak, amoral tale that didn't do great business as the backers weren't sure how to market it. An embittered hitman returns to his home town for revenge of his brother's death. I won't say anymore as it'll spoil the plot, but it's well worth a look. ****s.

you better have the 39 steps and trainspotting in this list of yours annie...

or else...

just kidding mate...

I was thinking about TS... but how much of a **** would I sound if I said I'd never seen the 39 Steps?

[TBear]

Hitchcock had white teef.






EDIT: Hope he gets acknowledgement for his work.

Dead of Night (1945)

In many ways this probably shouldn't be in my top ten, given that it's a bit cheesy, I suppose. But I just love it, so **** off. A portmanteau horror film with a circular ending that reputedly (according to that fount of wisdom, Wankopedia) inspired the steady state theory of the universe, this goes back to what I was talking about earlier, re: old style of speaking in English films.

When someone tells a tale and we return to the linking narrative, people don't go "fuck me, that sounds scary.... I've nearly fucking shit me pants, yer ****." They go "I say, that's frightfully alarming, old bean.. what a perishing tale, what?" The key piece here is Michael Redgrave as a ventriloquist totally off his ****.