Bishop-11

Following in the tradition of Eric Sykes' previous silent comedy shorts ("The Plank", "Mr H Is Late" et al), "The Big Freeze" is a highly amusing little diversion that keeps the chuckles coming all the way through.

Bob Hoskins revels in the chance to play a little slapstick as the plumber's hapless son, and he just about eclipses the very funny cameo roles from veteren stars John Mills, Donald Pleasence and Spike Milligan, who almost steals the film with his turn as a manic Adolf Hitler impersonator (complete with stuffed dog!).

It's hard to believe, given the popularity of his earlier silent comedies, that Sykes allegedly found financing hard to come by in the UK for this film (hence why it was made in Finland), and its a sad reflection on the British film & TV industry that simple but effective little productions like this can't be made more often.

Tricksy psychological thriller where no one is what they seems, nor indeed do they do what they seem!

It's well cast (almost perfekt, in fact) with the performers seeming to enjoy themselves in their roles. Angela Plummer & David Thewlis are no strangers to playing off-the-wall characters and excel as always, but it's Robert Forster who steals the film and shows along with his superb performance in "Jackie Brown" what an under-rated character actor he is.

If I've one criticism to make it's that when the characters are a little better revealed halfway through the film some of the tension dissipates a little but the plot keeps twisting and turning to the very end.

Worth a couple of hours of your time.

Excellent little supernatural anthology series, supposedly based on true accounts, with an excellent mixture of quality guest stars from both sides of the Atlantic, including Denholm Elliott, David Warner, Karen Black and Eli Wallach.

Relegated to late-night British TV when it first came out, the series hasn't reappeared since, and richly deserves a re-showing and critical re-evaluation.