George Murcell
Also Known As: not available
Biography: Arthur George Murcell (30 October 1925 – 3 December 1998) was a British character actor. Born in Italy, he made his film debut in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Battle of the River Plate (1956), Murcell went on to develop a career playing snarling villains in both film and television. These could either be stupid, brutish henchmen, as in Hell Drivers and Campbell's Kingdom (both 1957), or sophisticated rogues, such as Needle in "You Have Just Been Murdered", an episode of The Avengers. He specialised in playing foreign characters, including Germans, Russians and South Americans. A number of these roles were in ITC adventure TV series of the 1960s and 1970s, such as Danger Man, The Baron, The Saint, The Champions (Reply Box No.666 episode, 1967) Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased), The Persuaders! and Jason King. His film roles included Sea of Sand (1958), The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964), The Heroes of Telemark (1965), Kaleidoscope (1966), The Fixer (1968), A Dandy in Aspic (1968), The Assassination Bureau (1969), A Walk with Love and Death (1969), Penny Gold (1973), Special Branch (1974), Inside the Third Reich (1982, as Hermann Göring), Year of the Gun (1991), and Cutthroat Island (1995). He enjoyed a long stage career, which involved working with Tyrone Guthrie and Peter Brook, and was active in the Royal Shakespeare Company.In the 1970s, he acquired a Victorian church in North London, which he converted into an Elizabethan-style theatre in collaboration with director Adrian Brown. In 1973, he opened it as "St George's Theatre", intending that it present little-seen classical plays. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, he continued to work at St George's Theatre as both an actor and a director, often with his wife, Elvi Hale.
Department: Acting
Place of Birth: Naples, Campania, Italy
Birthday: October 30, 1925
Deathday: December 03, 1998
Adult: No
Gender: Male
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Known For:
Sea of Sand
Overview: A small British army team is sent deep behind enemy lines to destroy a German petrol dump as part of the preparation for a major attack in the North African campaign. Sea of Sand was distributed in the US in a shortened version, Desert Patrol.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1958-11-04
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In Search of the Castaways
Overview: Two teenagers, Mary (Hayley Mills) and Robert (Keith Hamshere) are lead by Professor Paganel (Maurice Chevalier) on a search expedition for the children's shipwrecked sea captain father. This Disney film was based upon Jules Verne's 1868 adventure novel Captain Grant's Children.
Genres: Adventure Family
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1962-12-01
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The Cherry Orchard
Overview: Madame Ranevsky and her daughter Anya return home from Paris to find that their beloved family estate and cherry orchard are to be auctioned off to pay debts. Lopahin, a former serf on the estate who is now a wealthy landowner, proposes razing the home and cherry orchard and dividing the estate into plots that could be leased at great profit. The family, however, continues to hold out hope that their beloved home can somehow be saved from destruction.
Genres: Drama TV Movie
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1962-04-17
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The Year of the Sex Olympics
Overview: Influenced by concerns about overpopulation, the counterculture of the 1960s and the societal effects of television, the play depicts a world of the future where a small elite control the media, keeping the lower classes docile by serving them an endless diet of lowest common denominator programmes and pornography. The play concentrates on an idea the programme controllers have for a new programme which will follow the trials and tribulations of a group of people left to fend for themselves on a remote island. In this respect, the play is often cited as having anticipated the craze for reality television.
Genres: Drama Science Fiction TV Movie
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1968-07-29
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The Fall of the Roman Empire
Overview: In the year 180 A.D. Germanic tribes are about to invade the Roman empire from the north. In the midst of this crisis ailing emperor Marcus Aurelius has to make a decision about his successor between his son Commodus, who is obsessed by power, and the loyal general Gaius Livius.
Genres: Drama History War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1964-03-24
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The Assassination Bureau
Overview: In 1908 London, a women's rights campaigner discovers the Assassination Bureau Limited, an organization that kills for justice. When its motives are called into question, she commissions the assassination of its chairman. Knowing that his colleagues have recently become more motivated by greed than morality, he turns the situation into a challenge for his board members: kill him or be killed.
Genres: Comedy Crime Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1969-03-09
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The Angry Silence
Overview: When the union in his factory walks out on strike, a family man refuses to participate, risking the wrath — and retaliation — of his fellow workers.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1960-03-10
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There Was a Crooked Man
Overview: When a law-abiding demolition expert is duped by a gang of criminals into helping them he is caught and jailed. When he is released he goes straight and then notices a leading citizen in his town is cheating his neighbours.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1960-08-31
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A Walk with Love and Death
Overview: During France’s Hundred Years’ War, a Parisian student seeks refuge by the sea and falls in love with an aristocrat. As they find shelter in a monastery, their romance is overshadowed by the ongoing conflict between peasants and noblemen.
Genres: Adventure Drama History Romance War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1969-10-05
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Mafia Junction
Overview: Cliff works as a narcotics investigator for the police and infiltrate a mafia gang. Soon it turns out that Cliff has bigger plans than just to bust bad guys.
Genres: Action
Original Language: it
Release Date: 1973-03-05
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Pascali's Island
Overview: 1908: Pascali, a spy for the Sultan, sends reports to Istanbul that nobody reads. His suspicions are roused when a British archaeologist appears, who may not be quite what he seems.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1988-07-22
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Crossroads to Crime
Overview: Crossroads to Crime is about the investigations of a police constable (Anthony Oliver) who, working undercover without support from his colleagues, confronts and brings down a gang of vehicle hi-jackers.
Genres: Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1960-11-01
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Don't Panic Chaps!
Overview: During World War II, four British soldiers are commissioned to set up an observation post on a seemingly deserted island in the Mediterranean. However, while surveying the island, the Brits come across four German soldiers holed up in a monastery. The Brits and the Germans agree to a truce, sharing the monastery together until either the British or German troops arrive. But when a shipwrecked Slavic girl ends up on the island, a battle over her erupts amongst the men.
Genres: War Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1959-01-01
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Penelope Pulls It Off
Overview: A society lady lives mainly from selling forged paintings by old masters. To keep the business flourishing, she invites art experts to orgies.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: de
Release Date: 1975-05-02
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Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Overview: A two-part program that examines the life of Samuel Coleridge from his orphaned childhood to how his friendship with William and Dorothy Wordsworth inspired him to write The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Part 2 consists of a visualization of Coleridge’s epic poem.
Genres: Adventure Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1975-06-11
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A Sound from the Sea
Overview: While hitchhiking towards the coast, two young men find themselves trapped at an inn by its strange landlord and his beautiful wife.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1970-08-17
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Penny Gold
Overview: While investigating a murder case, a detective stumbles upon a rare-stamp swindle involving the victim's twin sister.
Genres: Thriller Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1973-06-22
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Blood of the Vampire
Overview: A man and wife are terrorized by Mad Scientist Dr. Callistratus who was executed but has returned to life with a heart transplant. Along with his crippled assistant Carl, the 'anemic' Mad Scientist, believed to be a vampire, conducts blood deficiency research on the inmates of a prison hospital for the criminally insane to sustain his return to life.
Genres: Horror Science Fiction
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1958-08-25
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The Horsemen
Overview: In Afghanistan, the ruthless sport of buzkashi is a game of great pride. When Uraz breaks his leg and loses a spirited match, he brings shame to his village, especially his father. After losing his leg below the knee, Uraz, to regain his honor, must learn to ride again and win with a special, one-of-a-kind horse.
Genres: Action Adventure Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1971-08-16
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The Battle of the River Plate
Overview: In the early years of the World War II, the Royal Navy is fighting a desperate battle to keep the Atlantic convoy routes open to supply the British Isles, facing the great danger posed by the many German warships, such as the Admiral Graf Spee, which are scouring the ocean for cargo ships to sink.
Genres: Drama History War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1956-10-30
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The Possessed
Overview: Adaptation of Dostoevsky's novel about liberal discussion versus revolutionary action in a provincial Russian town in the mid-nineteenth century.
Genres: TV Movie Horror
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1969-05-02
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The Heroes of Telemark
Overview: Set in German-occupied Norway, resistance fighter Knut Straud enlists the reluctant physicist Rolf Pedersen in an effort to destroy the German heavy water production plant in rural Telemark.
Genres: Action Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1965-11-12
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Cutthroat Island
Overview: Morgan Adams and her slave, William Shaw, are on a quest to recover the three portions of a treasure map. Unfortunately, the final portion is held by her murderous uncle, Dawg. Her crew is skeptical of her leadership abilities, so she must complete her quest before they mutiny against her. This is made yet more difficult by the efforts of the British crown to end her pirate raids.
Genres: Action Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1995-12-22
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The Naked Runner
Overview: Sam Laker is an American industrialist, working in Britain, who has just been awarded an international award for industrial design. He is planning to travel to East Germany to attend a trade show and show off his invention, taking his 10 year old son with him for a holiday. Meanwhile a British Intelligence officer who served with Laker in the Second World War decides to use the opportunity of Laker's trip and his lack of an intelligence profile to coerce him into carrying out an assassination.
Genres: Drama Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1967-07-19
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Sea Fury
Overview: The captain of a tugboat harboured off a Spanish village is lured into a romantic involvement with a young girl at the behest of her father, in the hope of getting his hands on the vessel. Meanwhile, a handsome English sailor, signs on to the boat and before long he and the girl fall for one another. Meanwhile a sinking freighter carrying explosive cargo has to be salvaged....
Genres: Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1958-08-26
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The Merry Christmas
Overview: Musical adaptation of A Christmas Carol.
Genres: Drama Fantasy Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1955-12-21
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Campbell's Kingdom
Overview: Given only six months to live, Englishman Bruce Campbell goes to Canada to claim "Campbell's Kingdom", the land he inherited from his grandfather. In order to clear his grandfather's name and prove there is oil on the land, Campbell must face up to a ruthless contractor and work against the clock to find oil before "Campbell's Kingdom" is flooded by a new power dam.
Genres: Adventure Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-09-03
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The Pursuers
Overview: A group of former concentration camp prisoners has formed an underground network to hunt Nazi leaders, who are still on the loose. At a secret meeting in Paris they discuss what to do with the former Auschwitz commandant Karl Brochmann, who since 12 years lives in London under the false identity of Karl Luther. They decide to take the law in their own hands, and send their member David to London. He starts his commission by scaring Luther, to see his reactions. Luther is already nervous, because the newspapers are writing about the capture of Eichmann. When he finds out that somebody has broken into his apartment and painted a swastika on his mirror, he gets terrified. He empties his bank account, packs a bag with all his cash and runs away, followed by David.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1961-12-31
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You Only Live Twice
Overview: A mysterious spacecraft captures Russian and American space capsules and brings the two superpowers to the brink of war. James Bond investigates the case in Japan and comes face to face with his archenemy Blofeld.
Genres: Action Thriller Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1967-06-13
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Hell Drivers
Overview: An ex-con trying to go clean ends up working for a crooked trucking company swindling money.
Genres: Thriller Drama Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-07-23
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Inside the Third Reich
Overview: A dramatization of the life of Albert Speer, Hitler's young architect and onetime confidant, and his meteoric rise into the Nazi hierarchy. Based upon Speer's own monograph of the same title.
Genres: History War Drama TV Movie
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1982-05-09
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Year of the Gun
Overview: American novelist David Raybourne accidentally becomes entangled in the Red Brigade's terrorist plan to kidnap Italian Premier Aldo Moro during a research trip to Rome. As the terrorists attempt to kill David, he and his photojournalist friend must struggle to stay alive.
Genres: Action Thriller Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1991-09-10
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Kaleidoscope
Overview: Barney Lincoln is a rambling gambling man who scores sensational wins at poker and chemin de fer because he has succeeded in marking the original plates for the backs of all the playing cards manufactured in a plant in Geneva and used in all the gambling joints in Europe. In his gambling depredation, Barney is spotted by Angel McGinnis, the daughter of a Scotland Yard Inspector 'Manny' McGinnis on the lookout for a man to do a job. The inspector enlists Barney's help in playing poker with a shady London character whom Scotland Yard wants to force to financial ruin.
Genres: Comedy Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1966-07-01
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A Dandy in Aspic
Overview: Double-agent Alexander Eberlin is assigned by the British to hunt out a Russian spy, known to them as Krasnevin. Only Eberlin knows that Krasnevin is none other than himself! Accompanying him on his mission is a ruthless partner, who gradually discovers his secret as Eberlin tries to maneuver himself out of a desperate situation.
Genres: Thriller Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1968-04-02
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