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Two films by John Guillermin
The third release from the BFI's Adelphi Collection is a vintage double bill of drama and comedy from British director John Guillermin (Death on the Nile, The Towering Inferno), released for the very first time, in a Dual Format Edition, containing Blu-ray and DVD versions of both films.
The Crowded Day (1954) sees five young women's lives intertwine in a bitter-sweet tale of shop-floor intrigue. Set against the busy backdrop of a department store in post-war London, and with interiors shot at Bourne & Hollingsworth on Oxford Street adding authenticity, this engaging, tightly-written ensemble piece is bustling with familiar faces from the golden era of British cinema, including John Gregson, Joan Rice, Thora Hird, Vera Day, Edward Chapman, Rachel Roberts, Dora Bryan, Dandy Nichols, Prunella Scales, Sid James and Richard Wattis.
A high-quality comedy-drama aimed squarely at the women's market, and billed as “a story of shop girls and their men,†The Crowded Day was perhaps the most ambitious production of the family-run Adelphi film company. Still resonant today, it offers both top-drawer entertainment and a fascinating insight into women's lives, experiences and aspirations - from fashions to family - in the post-war period.
Song of Paris (1952) is a delightful romantic comedy which sees an archetypal Englishman - suavely played by debonair Dennis Price - return from a jaunt abroad to face a dastardly foreign count in a screwball duel for the hand of a beautiful mademoiselle.
Digitally restored and with new High Definition transfers taken from the original elements preserved at the BFI National Archive, the films are presented in a Dual Format Edition (Blu-ray and DVD) and packaged with an illustrated booklet that includes film notes, original promotional materials and new essays by John Guillermin, actresses Vera Day and Prunella Scales, author Mary Cadogan and BFI Curator Vic Pratt.
Adelphi Films was a small British company run by Arthur Dent and his sons that produced more than thirty films in the 1940s and 1950s from crime pictures and musicals to colourful melodramas and slapstick comedies. Peter Sellers, Sid James, Diana Dors, Petula Clark, Ronnie Corbett, Rolf Harris and Prunella Scales are just some of the many well-loved performers who appeared before Adelphi's cameras early on in their careers. Adelphi is now managed by Arthur Dent's granddaughter Kate Lees and the company's original film materials - for a long time stored in a suburban garage in London - are now safely preserved at the BFI National Archive.
Release date: 14 February 2011
RRP: £19.99 / cat. no. BFIB1084 / cert PG
UK / 1954 and 1952 / black & white / English language / 83 mins & 80 mins /
Original aspect ratio 1.33:1
