The best Alan Bennett’s documentary movies
If you love cinema, you will share this ranking of the best Alan Bennett’s movies, although you may have ordered them differently. In any case, we hope you love it and with a little luck discovering a movie that you still don’t know about Alan Bennett.
National Theatre Live: 50 Years on Stage
8.7/10
To celebrate its 50th anniversary, the National Theatre of Great Britain presents National Theatre: 50 Years on Stage, bringing together the best British actors for a unique evening of unforgettable performances, broadcast live from London to cinemas around the world.
Remember the Secret Policeman's Ball ?
The Secret Policeman benefit shows for Amnesty International brought together comedy grand masters - from Python and Beyond the Fringe - and performers then relatively unknown, like Rowan Atkinson. Narrated by Dawn French, the programme includes interviews with many of the comedians and musicians who took part: John Cleese, Stephen Fry, Michael Palin, Sting, Lenny Henry and many more. The shows and their stars had a huge effect on modern British comedy. There are few comics today whose careers have not been heavily influenced by the anarchic and surreal humour of these events.
Pleasure at Her Majesty's
7.3/10
The first of the Amnesty International comedy benefit galas. The title is a play on the phrase at Her Majesty's pleasure (the show was performed at Her Majesty's Theatre, London). This show came to be considered part of the Secret Policeman's Ball series of shows that it inspired, although it pre-dated the first show in the series by three years. The event was organized by a team of three: Monty Python member John Cleese, Amnesty's Assistant Director Peter Luff and Transatlantic Records executive Martin Lewis. It featured the cream of Britain's comedic talent of the era, setting a precedent that would inspire many subsequent Amnesty galas...
The Importance of Being Morrissey
7.6/10
The Importance of Being Morrissey is the most revealing and quotable documentary made on Steven Patrick Morrissey. In it, he compares meat eating to child abuse; attacks the Royal Family and Tony Blair; responds to the accusations of racism, and we hear about his depression. There’s also some great concert footage and a mixed selection of celebrity fans who explain their fervor for the Mozz.
Beyond the Fringe
7.8/10
A TV version of the stage show originally performed at the Edinburgh Fringe (August 1962) and in London (Fortune Theatre, May 1961) and Broadway (October 1962).
Stop All the Clocks: W.H. Auden in an Age of Anxiety
Thirty years after his BBC film The Auden Landscape, director Adam Low returns to the poet and his work. Following surges of popularity - from featuring in Four Weddings And A Funeral to being the poet New Yorkers turned to after 9/11 - Low reveals how Auden’s poetry helps us to better understand the 21st century and the tumultuous political climate in which we now live.
Being Alan Bennett
Documentary providing a rare glimpse into the life of Alan Bennett, one of the UK's best-loved writers, with interviews, archive footage and new work.
Alan Bennett's Diaries
7.1/10
Documentary about British author and actor Alan Bennett. Recorded over the course of a year, the film features a number of intimate encounters with Bennett, including a trip to New York to receive an award from the city's public library, a national radio appearance and a visit to his local community-run library in Primrose Hill, London. Reflecting on key periods of his life as well as providing observations on current events.
