The best John Slater’s movies
If you love cinema, you will share this ranking of the best John Slater’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 John Slater.
The Million Pound Note
6.8/10
An impoverished American sailor is fortunate enough to be passing the house of two rich gentlemen who have conceived the crazy idea of distributing a note worth one million pounds. The sailor finds that whenever he tries to use the note to buy something, people treat him like a king and let him have whatever he likes for free. Ultimately, the money proves to be more troublesome than it is worth when it almost costs him his dignity and the woman he loves.
Violent Playground
6.6/10
A Liverpool juvenile liaison officer struggles with a young and dangerous pyromaniac.
'Pimpernel' Smith
7.2/10
Eccentric Cambridge archaeologist Horatio Smith (Howard) takes a group of British and American archaeology students to pre-war Nazi Germany to help in his excavations. His research is supported by the Nazis, since he professes to be looking for evidence of the Aryan origins of German civilisation. However, he has a secret agenda: to free inmates of the concentration camps.
Passport to Pimlico
7.1/10
When an unexploded WWII bomb is accidentally detonated in Pimlico, it reveals a treasure trove and documents proving that the region is in fact part of Burgundy, France and thus foreign territory. The British government attempts to regain control by setting up border controls and cutting off services to the area.
Went the Day Well?
7.5/10
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.
The Ringer
6.4/10
An underhand solicitor receives threatening notes, and the police are called in to protect him.
It Always Rains on Sunday
7.1/10
During a rainy Sunday afternoon, an escaped prisoner tries to hide out at the home of his ex-fiance.
Unpublished Story
6.4/10
Morale-boosting story released in the middle of World War II. A journalist uncovers a peace organisation at the centre of disreputable dealings.
Noose
6.1/10
Set in post Second World War Britain, Noose is the story of black market racketeers who face attempts to bring them to justice by an American fashion journalist, her ex-army fiancée and a gang of honest toughs from a local gym. When a corpse turns up at black market front The Blue Moon Club, Yank reporter Carole Landis starts snooping, much to gang boss Joseph Calleia’s annoyance. And soon there’s a hit man on the way...
Nothing Barred
5.2/10
Penniless Lord Whitebait's plan to save his sinking fortunes is to open stately Whitebait Manor to the public. But the public ignores his gesture, and his fortunes fade even further, with a stream of debts threatening to run into a deluge when his daughter's fiancé demands a plush and costly wedding. Where is the cash to come from? Whitebait and his servant Spankforth's answer is a scam involving the theft of a valuable painting from the Manor. How could such a cunningly original ruse fail?
I Live in Grosvenor Square
6.1/10
The WW II romance set in Grosvenor square aka Eisenhower's home where the GIs stayed in London. Neagle loves Harrison. There arrives patriot GI Dean Jagger to rouse things up in the square. Snotty British Neagle and Jagger clash and fall for each other. What will Harrison have to say or do about these? What will the consequences be? Will the three finally become two and which two in this extremely patriotic love and war story.
The Flanagan Boy
5.7/10
Johnny Flanagan did not have the privileges of a good education or wealthy background but the streets developed his natural talent to be a great fighter. His enormous potential to reach the top is born out of a string of spectacular successes. All of which is brought to a halt when he develops a physical relationship with his manager's wife, the beautiful but manipulative Lorna. His naive temperament is no match for her callous, dispassionate scheming and he unwittingly becomes a pawn in Lorna's ultimate plan... .to murder her husband.
The Seventh Veil
6.7/10
A concert pianist with amnesia fights to regain her memory.
The Long Memory
7/10
1953 British noir thriller, starring John Mills. An innocent man is released from prison after 12 years and tracks down the witnesses who lied about him in court. Based on a 1951 novel by Howard Clewes.
Against the Wind
6.3/10
A disparate group of volunteers are trained as saboteurs and parachuted into Belgium to blow up an office containing important Nazi records and to rescue a prominent S.O.E. agent, who is being interrogated by the Germans for vital information.
Escape
6.6/10
Escape is a thriller about a World War II vet who goes to prison for murder and then escapes. He meets a woman who tries to get him to surrender.
Love on the Dole
6.6/10
Depressing and realistic family drama about the struggles of unemployment and poverty in 1930s Lancashire. The 20-year-old Kerr gives an emotionally charged performance as Hardcastle, one of the cotton workers trying to make life better. Interlaced with humour that brings a ray of sunshine to the pervasive bleakness, this remains a powerful social study of life between the wars, and was a rare problem picture to come out of Britain at the time.
The Third Visitor
6.5/10
Suave supercilious Carling (Karel Stepanek) receives several callers to his isolated house, all of whom hold a grudge against him. Next morning a corpse is found, and later identified as his by one of the visitors.
A Place to Go
6.5/10
Set in contemporary Bethnal Green in east London, A Place to Go charts the dramatic changes that were happening in the lives of the British working-class at the time.
Star of India
5.6/10
Squire Pierre St. Laurent returns from wars in India to 17th-century provincial France to find his estate confiscated by governor Narbonne, for back taxes, and resold to Katrina, a Dutch Countess. Katrina offers to return Pierre's property if he will help her get possession of the 'Star of India,' a fabulous sapphire, held at the moment by Narbonne.
