Those British 1940s and 1960s ...

It now seems to me that the great era of British movies were the 1940s and the 1960s - think those black and white classics - while the 1950s British movies were basically those Rank Organisation comedies - the DOCTORS and melodramas with Dirk Bogarde, and those war films with Kenneth More, Richard Todd, Jack Hawkins, while Kay Kendall did some stylish comedy (GENEVIEVE and SIMON AND LAURA), then the later 50s saw the start of the CARRY ONs and the Hammer Films .... as that New Wave kicked in with those early '60s films we like here (A TASTE OF HONEY, A KIND OF LOVING, BILLY LIAR, THE SERVANT, DARLING and the American companies poured in financing those Swinging 60s films - notably MGM with Antonioni's BLOW-UP and others.
The early '70s had a few good ones too, with items like Schlesinger's SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY, Losey's THE GO-BETWEEN, Roeg's DON'T LOOK NOW before that '70s tat took over...

Lets have a look at those great eras, starting with Jean Simmons as Estella tripping along to let young pip in to play for Miss Havisham in - what else - GREAT EXPECTATIONS, above, and those lovers caught at Milford Junction in BRIEF ENCOUNTER, in that great era of David Lean, Carol Reed, Michael Powell films - timeless classics all, as we love THIS HAPPY BREED, THE WAY TO THE STARS, BLACK NARCISSUS (above), I KNOW WHERE I'M GOING et al. 

The Sixties of course saw all that new talent emerge - Julie, Susannah, Tom, Terence, the Yorks,  O'Toole, Finney, Bates et al... 

THIS HAPPY BREED, left, and  THE SERVANT which it was great to see back on a cinema screen earlier this year, (to launch its Blu-ray release, with 3 of its stars (Fox, Miles, Craig) in attendance to discuss it, 50 years later - how often does that happen? (as per my notes at Bogarde, Losey, Miles, Fox labels).

Above: Rita and Melvin in A TASTE OF HONEY, watching tv with mother in law in A KIND OF LOVING, Julie and Ronald and the Italian waiter in DARLING; Hemmings in BLOW-UP, and below, the alternative title for I WAS HAPPY HERE - Sarah Miles in Ireland, before BLOW-UP in London.  There were also of course '60s black and white classics like GIRL WITH GREEN EYES, MORGAN and GEORGY GIRL

Then came the colour 60s with BLOW-UP, WHATS NEW PUSSYCAT?, SMASHING TIME et al., as per my previous 60s posts.