Mervyn Johns
Also Known As: David Mervyn Johns
Biography: Father of actress Glynis Johns, who appeared with him in The Halfway House (1944) and The Sundowners (1960). Stocky, benevolent-looking Welsh character who became an unexpected star of British movies during WWII, then moved quickly into post-war supports, with one of his fondly-remembered parts being that of the cowering "Bob Cratchit" to Alastair Sim's cold-hearted "Ebenezer Scrooge" in the definitive film version of A Christmas Carol (1951).
Department: Acting
Place of Birth: Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales, UK
Birthday: February 17, 1899
Deathday: September 06, 1992
Adult: No
Gender: Male
Popularity:
Known For:
Moby Dick
Overview: In 1841, young Ishmael signs up for service aboard the Pequod, a whaler sailing out of New Bedford. The ship is under the command of Captain Ahab, a strict disciplinarian who exhorts his men to find Moby Dick, the great white whale. Ahab lost his his leg to that creature and is desperate for revenge. As the crew soon learns, he will stop at nothing to gain satisfaction.
Genres: Adventure Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1956-06-27
Popularity:
Went the Day Well?
Overview: The quiet village of Bramley End is taken over by German troops posing as Royal Engineers. Their task is to disrupt England's radar network in preparation for a full scale German invasion. Once the villagers discover the true identity of the troops, they do whatever they can to thwart the Nazis plans.
Genres: War Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1942-12-07
Popularity:
Jamaica Inn
Overview: In coastal Cornwall, England, during the early 19th Century, a young woman who's come there to visit her aunt, discovers that she's married an innkeeper who's a member of a gang of criminals who arrange shipwrecking and murder for profit.
Genres: Crime Adventure Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1939-05-11
Popularity:
Scrooge
Overview: Ebenezer Scrooge malcontentedly shuffles through life as a cruel, miserly businessman; until he is visited by three spirits on Christmas Eve who show him how his unhappy childhood and adult behavior has left him a selfish, lonely old man.
Genres: Fantasy Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1951-11-28
Popularity:
Dead of Night
Overview: Architect Walter Craig, seeking the possibility of some work at a country farmhouse, soon finds himself once again stuck in his recurring nightmare. Dreading the end of the dream that he knows is coming, he must first listen to all the assembled guests' own bizarre tales.
Genres: Horror Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1945-09-09
Popularity:
The Old Dark House
Overview: An American car salesman in London becomes mixed up in a series of fatal occurrences at a secluded mansion.
Genres: Comedy Horror Mystery
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1963-10-30
Popularity:
Never Let Go
Overview: John Cummings, an unsuccessful cosmetics salesman, has his unpaid-for car stolen by one of the hoods in the employ of Lionel Meadows, the sadistic organizer of a London car conversion racket. The car was not insured, and since the police appear indifferent to his plight, Cummings decides to find it himself -- and gets himself involved in an underworld battle.
Genres: Thriller Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1960-06-02
Popularity:
Echo of Barbara
Overview: Barbara is the long-lost sister of no-good Mike Roscoe (Ronald Hines). Paula Brown (Maureen Connell) is the stripper whom Mike hires to pose as Barbara. It's all part of a scheme to fool Mike's ex-convict dad Sam Roscoe (Mervyn Johns). The son hopes to entice Sam into revealing the whereabouts of his stolen money, and Paula is hopefully going to do the trick. Based on a novel by Jonathan Burke, Echo of Barbara is a better-than-usual British programmer, entertaining despite its surplus of unpleasant leading characters.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1961-04-29
Popularity:
San Demetrio London
Overview: British drama documentary from 1943, based on the true story of the 1940 rescue of the tanker MV San Demetrio by parts of her own crew after she had been set afire in the middle of the Atlantic by the German heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer and then had been abandoned. When one of the lifeboats drifted back to the burning tanker the day after, and found that she still hadn't exploded, they decided to board her and put out the fires. Eventually, they managed to start the engine again and decided to try to reach Britain against all odds.
Genres: Action Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1943-12-07
Popularity:
The Captive Heart
Overview: A series of stories about the lives and loves of men in a Prisoner of War camp over five years. The main story is of Hasek (Redgrave) a Czech soldier who needs to keep his identity a secret from the Nazis. To do this, he poses as a dead English Officer and corresponds with the man's wife. Other inmates’ stories are also revealed. Location shooting in the British occupied part of Germany adds believability.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1946-04-29
Popularity:
Diamond City
Overview: Set in the diamond fields of South Africa, Stafford Parker is a lawman trying to maintain a semblance of law and order in the "Wild South".
Genres: Western Adventure Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1949-09-20
Popularity:
Romeo and Juliet
Overview: In Shakespeare's classic play, the Montagues and Capulets, two families of Renaissance Italy, have hated each other for years, but the son of one family and the daughter of the other fall desperately in love and secretly marry.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1954-09-01
Popularity:
Finger of Guilt
Overview: Film producer Reggie Wilson is worried he may have a dual personality. Fleeing Hollywood, he finds himself in England and married to the studio boss's daughter after which he quickly rises through the studio ranks. Then the letters begin to appear from a lovesick American actress who wants to know why he has thrown her over.
Genres: Drama Thriller Mystery
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1956-06-01
Popularity:
Pink String and Sealing Wax
Overview: Melodrama set in Victorian Brighton. Scheming pub landlady uses the timorous son of a domineering pharmacist to assist in the poisoning of her drunkard husband. (The title is from the way pharmacists used to wrap parcels containing poison).
Genres: Thriller Drama Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1945-11-22
Popularity:
Edward, My Son
Overview: Following the death of his only son, a ruthless businessman reflects on his life, his unhappy marriage and his questionable parenting skills.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1949-03-01
Popularity:
The Counterfeit Plan
Overview: An escaped murderer flees France to England, where he forces an ex-forger, now established as a reputable estate owner, and the forger's daughter who knew nothing of his past, to counterfeit 5-pound notes for mass distribution around the countryside.
Genres: Crime Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-01-01
Popularity:
Easy Money
Overview: A win on the football pools in postwar Britain changes lives. A happy family is turned into an unhappy argumentative lot until it is discovered the coupon apparently didn't get posted. A mild-mannered clerk worries about how to tell his overbearing boss he is quitting. A double-bass player finds life without the orchestra lacks something. The lure of the big money even turns some people into criminals, as when a coupon checker is tempted by his night-club singer girlfriend to cheat the company. Written by Jeremy Perkins
Genres: Crime Drama Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1948-01-20
Popularity:
Francis of Assisi
Overview: In 13th century Italy, Francis Bernardone, the son of an Assisi merchant, renounces a promising army career in favor of a monastic life and starts his own religious order, sanctioned by the Pope.
Genres: History Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1961-07-12
Popularity:
The Halfway House
Overview: A group of travellers, each with a personal problem that they want to hide, arrive at a mysterious Welsh country inn. There is a certain strangeness in the air as they are greeted by the innkeeper and his daughter. Why are all the newspapers a year old? And why doesn't Gwyneth seem to cast a shadow?
Genres: Mystery Drama Fantasy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1944-04-02
Popularity:
My Learned Friend
Overview: An insane murderer is on the loose, and gunning for the men who put him away. Will Hay is on the list, and co-opts Claude Hulbert to try and stop him from meeting a grisly end.
Genres: Comedy Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1943-10-25
Popularity:
Danger List
Overview: When a pharmacist accidentally prescribes poison instead of painkillers, the race is on to find the killer pills.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-12-26
Popularity:
Counterblast
Overview: An escaped World War 2 Nazi doctor impersonates a murdered English doctor so he can work on a vaccination to protect the Germans in their planned germ warfare.
Genres: Thriller Drama Action
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1948-05-18
Popularity:
Helter Skelter
Overview: A detective gets involved with a wealthy socialite who can't seem to stop hiccuping.
Genres: Comedy Romance Fantasy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1949-01-07
Popularity:
The National Health
Overview: Peter Nichols adapted his own hit play to the screen, based on his experiences in hospitals. A riotous black comedy that's as timely today as ever, it contrasts the appalling conditions in a overcrowded London hospital with a soap opera playing on the televisions there. In an ingenious touch, the same actors appear in the "real" story as well as the "TV" one, thus blurring the distinctions even further. Jack Gould directs such outstanding British actors as Lynn Redgrave, Colin Blakely, Eleanor Bron, Jim Dale, Donald Sinden, Mervyn Johns, and, in only his second film, Bob Hoskins. The renowned Carl Davis composed the score.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1973-03-06
Popularity:
No Love for Johnnie
Overview: Johnnie Byrne is a member of the British Parliament. In his 40s, he's feeling frustrated with his life and his personal as well as professional problems tower up over him. His desires to win the next election are endangered by his constant looking for love and he is faced with the choice of giving up a career in politics or giving up the woman he loves.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1961-02-14
Popularity:
The Gypsy and the Gentleman
Overview: A lusty Gypsy gold digger marries a Regency aristocrat, then learns he has no money.
Genres: Drama History
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1958-01-15
Popularity:
Once More, with Feeling!
Overview: The wife of brilliant, but boisterous and ill-tempered conductor of the London Symphony puts up with his childishness, but the last straw is drawn when he begins an affair with a young pianist.
Genres: Comedy Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1960-02-11
Popularity:
Saloon Bar
Overview: A bookmaker with a fancy for detective work attempts to prevent the execution of a potentially innocent man.
Genres: Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-11-02
Popularity:
The Bells Go Down
Overview: Comedian Tommy Trinder plays it straight in this tribute to the wartime AFS (Auxiliary Fire Service). The dedicated band who kept the fires of London under control during the blitz and fire bombings of WWII.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1943-05-16
Popularity:
They Knew Mr. Knight
Overview: After a chance train encounter with Laurence Knight, Tom Blake's family's fortunes prosper on the beneficence of the great financier. A developing friendship leads to the Knights selling their home to the Blakes when they move back to London. All looks rosy for the Blakes as share prices in Mr Knight's new business venture soar, but is their confidence misplaced?
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1946-03-05
Popularity:
Captain Boycott
Overview: Based on real events, this historical drama is set in 19th-century Ireland, when poverty-stricken tenants dispossessed by greedy landowner Capt. Boycott (Cecil Parker) band together to assert their rights. Patriotic farmer Hugh Davin (Stewart Granger) leads the rebels. Choosing nonviolent resistance, the villagers ostracize their nemesis, who squanders his fortune to repair his ruined reputation and wagers what's left on a horse race.
Genres: Drama History
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1947-08-26
Popularity:
80,000 Suspects
Overview: A doctor's already-shaky marriage is tested to an even greater extent when he has to contend with a smallpox epidemic.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1963-08-15
Popularity:
55 Days at Peking
Overview: Diplomats, soldiers and other representatives of a dozen nations fend off the siege of the International Compound in Peking during the 1900 Boxer Rebellion. The disparate interests unite for survival despite competing factions, overwhelming odds, delayed relief and tacit support of the Boxers by the Empress of China and her generals.
Genres: History War Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1963-05-06
Popularity:
Valley of Song
Overview: A little Welsh village is sundered by rival factions when a coveted contralto role in the "Messiah" is given to Mrs. Davies instead of Mrs. Lloyd. Based on a stage play "Choir Practice".
Genres: Comedy Music
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1953-06-08
Popularity:
In the Soup
Overview: A young married couple try to impress a rich relation by posing as maid and butler of the household.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-04-01
Popularity:
Tony Draws a Horse
Overview: The free-spirited wife of a proper British doctor leaves him after an arguement over the anatomically correct drawing of a horse on the wall drawn by their young son Tony.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1950-06-01
Popularity:
Storm in a Teacup
Overview: A local politician in Scotland tries to break the reporter who wrote a negative story about him, and who is also in love with his daughter.
Genres: Comedy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-02-25
Popularity:
Night Ride
Overview: Two truck drivers fired by the crooked trucking firm they worked for start their own company. Their former boss, worried about the competition, tries everything he can to drive them out of business, from sending his pretty daughter to seduce them to having his henchmen sabotage their trucks.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1937-06-28
Popularity:
The Sundowners
Overview: In the Australian Outback, the Carmody family--Paddy, Ida, and their teenage son Sean--are sheep drovers, always on the move. Ida and Sean want to settle down and buy a farm. Paddy wants to keep moving. A sheep-shearing contest, the birth of a child, drinking, gambling, and a racehorse will all have a part in the final decision.
Genres: Drama Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1960-12-08
Popularity:
Tall Headlines
Overview: A family is torn apart when their eldest son is hanged for the murder of a young girl.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1952-04-15
Popularity:
The Blue Peter
Overview: A Merchant Navy hero of the Korean War returns to England after three years of captivity in Communist hands, his mind confused by brain-washing and indoctrination at the hands of his captors, and accepts a post as an instructor at the Outward Bound Sea School.
Genres: Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1955-11-01
Popularity:
The Day of the Triffids
Overview: After an unusual meteor shower leaves most of the human population blind, a merchant navy officer must find a way to conquer tall, aggressive plants which are feeding on people and animals.
Genres: Science Fiction Horror
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1963-04-24
Popularity:
Dishonour Bright
Overview: A man is cited as the co-respondent in a divorce case, but is cheerfully unashamed when he appears in court.
Genres: Comedy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1936-09-21
Popularity:
Lady in Danger
Overview: Dexter becomes involved in a revolution and is asked to hide the Queen. This leads to misunderstanding with his firm and his fiancee.
Genres: Comedy Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1934-11-27
Popularity:
House of Mortal Sin
Overview: Also known as 'The Confessional', another of Pete Walkers's critiques of institutional hypocrisy, in which a troubled young girl goes to confession at the local church. Unfortunately, the sexually frustrated priest she confesses to becomes obsessed with her. At first, the priest stalks the girl, but later it is revealed that he will stop at nothing, including blackmail and murder, just to get close to her.
Genres: Horror
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1976-02-03
Popularity:
A Jolly Bad Fellow
Overview: An English professor decides that there are too many useless people in the world and invents a gas that will kill them off. But first they'll at least have a good laugh.
Genres: Comedy Crime
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1964-03-15
Popularity:
Girl in the News
Overview: An elderly lady manages to sneak some pills away from her nurse and dies of an overdose. The nurse is tried for murder and acquitted. Some time later the nurse, under a new name and identity, cares for a patient who also dies of an overdose. When her real identity comes out, suspicions arouses.
Genres: Crime Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-08-28
Popularity:
Convoy
Overview: A tale of life on board a Royal Navy cruiser assigned to protect the vital convoys between America and England during WWII.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1940-09-28
Popularity:
The National Health
Overview: Peter Nichols adapted his own hit play to the screen, based on his experiences in hospitals. A riotous black comedy that's as timely today as ever, it contrasts the appalling conditions in a overcrowded London hospital with a soap opera playing on the televisions there. In an ingenious touch, the same actors appear in the "real" story as well as the "TV" one, thus blurring the distinctions even further. Jack Gould directs such outstanding British actors as Lynn Redgrave, Colin Blakely, Eleanor Bron, Jim Dale, Donald Sinden, Mervyn Johns, and, in only his second film, Bob Hoskins. The renowned Carl Davis composed the score.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1973-03-06
Popularity:
Doctor at Large
Overview: Losing out to Dr. Bingham (Michael Medwin) in a competition for house surgeon when he offends a member of the board, young Dr. Simon Sparrow (Dirk Bogarde) finds himself going from post to post, filling in for other physicians. At one distant country post, he is taken aback when he works with a patient whose husband died after Simon treated the man years before. In another hospital, Simon examines a surprisingly mature teen and also tries courting devoted nurse Nan McPherson (Shirley Eaton).
Genres: Comedy Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-03-26
Popularity:
The Master of Ballantrae
Overview: Scottish highlander Jamie Durie falls into a life of piracy after joining the failed rebellion of Bonnie Prince Charlie against the British crown.
Genres: Adventure
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1953-08-05
Popularity:
Foreign Affaires
Overview: An ageing aristocrat schemes to secure his dwindling finances by any means – fair or foul!
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-11-21
Popularity:
The Next of Kin
Overview: Lots of slogans such as "Be like Dad, Keep Mum" and "Keep it under your Hat" are visible on the walls in various scenes to reinforce the plot of this British wartime movie illustrating how gossipy talk can result in unknowingly giving valuable information to Nazi spies.
Genres: Drama War Thriller Mystery
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1942-06-15
Popularity:
1984
Overview: In a totalitarian future society, a man whose daily work is rewriting history tries to rebel by falling in love.
Genres: Science Fiction Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1956-03-06
Popularity:
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
Popularity:
The Guv'nor
Overview: The Guv'nor (released in the U.S. as Mr. Hobo) is a 1935 British comedy film starring George Arliss as a tramp who rides a series of misunderstandings and becomes the president of a bank.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1935-10-01
Popularity:
Find the Lady
Overview: During New Year's Eve, a young model spends the day searching for her grandmother, who has suspiciously gone missing.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1956-10-01
Popularity:
The Magic Box
Overview: Now old, ill, poor, and largely forgotten, William Freise-Greene was once very different. As young and handsome William Green he changed his name to include his first wife's so that it sounded more impressive for the photographic portrait work he was so good at. But he was also an inventor and his search for a way to project moving pictures became an obsession that ultimately changed the life of all those he loved.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1952-01-01
Popularity:
The Devil's Disciple
Overview: In a small New England town during the American War of Independence, Dick Dudgeon, a revolutionary American Puritan, is mistaken for local minister Rev. Anthony Anderson and arrested by the British. Dick discovers himself incapable of accusing another human to suffer and continues to masquerade as the reverend.
Genres: War Comedy History
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1959-08-20
Popularity:
Quartet
Overview: Somerset Maugham introduces four of his tales in this anthology film: "The Facts of Life," "The Alien Corn," "The Kite," and "The Colonel's Lady."
Genres: Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1948-10-26
Popularity:
The Vicious Circle
Overview: When Dr. Howard Latimer finds the German actress whom he had just met at the London Airport murdered in his flat, he is led into a world of murder, blackmail, and a fake passport scam.
Genres: Crime Mystery Thriller
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-09-01
Popularity:
The Oracle
Overview: An Irish "oracle" foretells the next day's track results to a newspaperman, resulting in a national uproar.
Genres: Comedy Fantasy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1953-06-01
Popularity:
The Surgeon's Knife
Overview: A doctor becomes the victim of extortionists when one of his patients dies under questionable circumstances.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1957-10-01
Popularity:
The Foreman Went to France
Overview: Based on the true story of Melbourne Johns, an aircraft factory foreman sent to France to prevent the Nazis getting hold of some vital equipment.
Genres: War Drama
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1942-06-22
Popularity:
The Rebel
Overview: Anthony Hancock gives up his office job to become an abstract artist. He has a lot of enthusiasm, but little talent, and critics scorn his work. Nevertheless, he impresses an emerging very talented artist. Hancock proceeds to con the art world into thinking he is a genius.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1961-03-07
Popularity:
Who Killed the Cat?
Overview: A scheming widow tries to persecute three old ladies, but fate takes its revenge on her.
Genres: Mystery
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1966-10-07
Popularity:
Pride and Prejudice
Overview:
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: en
Release Date: 1938-01-01
Popularity: