BFI Flipside (Blu-ray)

[Mr Magister]

If anyone can they'll be the folk to get it out there.

[MikeW]

Or The Reckoning, another 60's Nicol Williamson vehicle.

Yes! I really can't understand why that film doesn't get more attention.

[BJR67]

The Screamtime trilogy - please please please!

Was great to see that material at the recent NFT event, a screening enhanced by the special guests in attendance.

It's great that this BFI initiative is being spun off as a DVD label.

BJR

[John Hodson]

That press release in full...

Discover The Flipside
A new DVD and Blu-ray strand from the BFI

On 25 May the BFI launches Flipside, a new strand presenting weird and wonderful British films in new high-quality editions on DVD and Blu-ray. The first three releases are Richard Lester’s darkly comic The Bed Sitting Room (1969) and Arnold Louis Miller’s pioneering Mondo-influenced ‘shockumentaries’ London in the Raw (1964) and Primitive London (1965).

Developed from its popular monthly screening slot at BFI Southbank, the BFI’s Flipside series on DVD and Blu-ray is designed to revisit and reappraise British films that have slipped through the cracks of cinema history – films that were overlooked, marginalised, or undervalued at the original time of release, or sit outside the established canon of recognised classics. Subject matter will vary widely (and will encompass everything from nuclear war to Soho striptease, from forbidden love to international intrigue) and is likely to appeal to a diverse range of film fans, many of whom may be unfamiliar with the BFI’s more traditional DVD and Blu-ray output.

All Flipside releases, newly-mastered in HD from original film elements, are presented with a wide array of special features and extensive illustrated booklets containing informative notes and thought-provoking essays. Initial contributors include respected writers Stewart Home and Iain Sinclair. They are priced at £17.99 on DVD and £22.99 on Blu-ray.

Three new Flipside titles will appear approximately every three months.Future releases includelong-unavailable British cult titles such as Peter Watkins’ Privilege (1967) and Gerry O’Hara’s That Kind of Girl (1963). Details of the titles to be released on 25 May are as follows:

The Bed Sitting Room (Richard Lester, 1969)
UK / colour / Cert tbc / 91 mins + 90 mins extra material / ratio 1.85:1 / optional subtitles for hearing-impaired / DVD cat no: BFIVD834 / BD cat no: BFIB1019

In the hazy aftermath of World War III, the fallout from a ‘nuclear misunderstanding’ (which lasted two minutes and twenty eight seconds, including the signing of the peace treaty) is producing strange mutations amongst the survivors, and the noble Lord Fortnum finds himself transforming into a bed sitting room…

This vividly imagined, darkly satirical filmic vision of a post apocalyptic England, directed by Richard Lester (A Hard Day’s Night, How I Won the War, The Knack), is based on the highly-regarded play by Spike Milligan and John Antrobus. It also boasts great performances by the cream of ‘60s British comedy and acting talent: Rita Tushingham, Ralph Richardson, Peter Cook, Harry Secombe, Dudley Moore, Spike Milligan, Michael Horden, Roy Kinnear, Arthur Lowe, Dandy Nichols and Marty Feldman.

Sam Dunn, Head of BFI Video Publishing, comments: ‘Lots of people talk about “lost classics”, but The Bed Sitting Room is a film that truly deserves that description. It beggars belief that such a startling piece of British cinema could have remained hidden away for so long.’

Special features
Archival interviews with Richard Lester (1967, 17 mins), Spike Milligan (1967, 40 mins) and Peter Cook (1967, 30 mins)
Original trailer
Illustrated booklet with essay by Michael Brooke (BFI Sight and Sound contributor) and original review and promotional material.

London in the Raw (Arnold Louis Miller, 1964)
UK / colour / Cert tbc / 76 min and 47 min versions + 80 mins extra material / ratio 1.33:1 / optional subtitles for hearing-impaired / DVD cat no: BFIVD840 / BD cat no: BFIB1021

‘The world's greatest city laid bare! Thrill to its gay excitement, its bright lights, but be shocked by the sin in its shadows!’
Following on from his Take Off Your Clothes and Live, and influenced by the world-wide success of Italian ‘Mondo’ movies, which combined documentary footage with staged sequences to salacious effect, legendary British low budget movie mogul Arnold Miller concocted this fascinating exploitation-style documentary. Peering voyeuristically behind the grimy net-curtains of London life into seedy bars and clubs for beatnik ‘art lovers’, and burrowing beneath the glittering façade of the capital’s glamorous cocktail lounges and casinos, London in the Raw provides a cynical, sometimes startling vision of life on and off the rain-spattered streets of 1960s London.
Special features
Remastered to HD from the original negative
Alternative, more explicit, version of the feature
Three 60s 'London Sketches': Pub (Peter Davis, 1962, 15 mins); Strip (Peter Davis, Staffan Lamm, Don DeFina, 1965, 26 mins); Chelsea Bridge Boys (Peter Davis, Staffan Lamm, 1966, 28 mins)
Original trailer
Illustrated booklet with essay by novelist and critic Stewart Home (author of Down and Out in Shoreditch and Hoxton); original review and promotional material; recollections by Davis, DeFina and Lamm

Primitive London (Arnold Louis Miller, 1965)
UK / colour / Cert tbc / 87 mins + 65 mins extra material / ratio 1.33:1 / optional subtitles for hearing-impaired / DVD cat no: BFIVD839 / BD cat no: BFIB1020

The sensational follow-up to London in the Raw, Primitive London sets out to reflect society’s decay through a sideshow spectacle of 1960s London depravity – and manages to out do its predecessor. Here, we confront mods, rockers and beatniks at the Ace Café, cut some rug with obscure beat band The Zephyrs, witness a seedy Jack the Ripper re-enactment, smirk at flabby men in the sauna and goggle at sordid wife-swapping parties as we discover a pre-permissive Britain still trying to move on from the post-war depression of the 1950s.

Special features
Remastered to HD from the original negative
Carousella (John Irvin, 1966, 26 mins): a dramatised documentary on the lives of a group of striptease artistes
Stuart McCabe (strip club owner) interview (1968, 15 mins)
Shirley (stripper) interview (1968, 6 mins)
Al Burnett (nightclub owner) interview (1967, 17 mins)
Original trailer (English and French language options)
English and French language versions of feature and trailer
Illustrated booklet with essays by Iain Sinclair, Vic Pratt (BFI Curator) and William Fowler (BFI Curator); original review and promotional material

[Andrew F]

This sounds like a fantastic range, and I don't think I could resist a Blu Ray of The Bed Sitting Room. Hopefully many more interesting titles will follow in the near future.

[Julian K]

Anyone interested in Primitive London might like to know that Arnold Louis Miller's West End Jungle is on BBC4 on Saturday, at 10.20pm.

[Bob]

Anyone interested in Primitive London might like to know that Arnold Louis Miller's West End Jungle is on BBC4 on Saturday, at 10.20pm.

Also repeated in the early hours of the 15th.

[Ross Gowland]

Detailed press release of this range at DVD Times.

Sounds flippin' great.

Now, wouldn't a BD of 80,000 Suspects be nice? *Hint, hint*

[Chris Pearson]

The Bedsitting Room extras sound good, especially the interviews:

* Archival interviews with Richard Lester (1967, 17 mins), Spike Milligan (1967, 40 mins) and Peter Cook (1967, 30 mins)

Does anyone have an idea of what these "interviews" are? Two of them are quite substantial, suggesting they might be complete episodes of contemporaneous arts series. My Googling ventures have drawn a blank.

[Daniel Wilcox]

Mumsy Nanny Sonny and Girly,

Wasn't that supposed to be released last year?

[David S.]

Mumsy Nanny Sonny and Girly,

Wasn't that supposed to be released last year?

Yes, but it didn't come out in the end.

EDIT: Checking find-dvd.co.uk, three retailers are listed as stocking it, but all say 'out of stock' or 'currently unavailable.' I don't think it came out.

Getting films like this with decent extras would be great.

[RobMesure]

Seconded on "I Start Counting", and "Mumsy..." for that matter. I have a sneaking suspicion that Second Run may release "Deep End" in the not too far off future. Hope so. Probably the only film ever to be soundtracked by Cat Stevens and Can...

[David S.]

Seconded on "I Start Counting", and "Mumsy..." for that matter. I have a sneaking suspicion that Second Run may release "Deep End" in the not too far off future. Hope so.

I hope they do it well, if so, and get the all-essential John Moulder Brown and Jane Asher commentary.

You could do great galleries for this film, too. I have a big press pack for it from the period with lots of text and 24 10 by 8 stills, and a lovely Japanese brochure. There was a very good poster and colour lobby cards, too. It seemed to be promoted quite well for such an art housey, relatively uncommercial film.

[Mr Magister]

The new BFI Southbank programme mentions this - also they are showing The Bed Sitting Room on 21st May with an introduction by Rita Tushingham.

Richard Lester will also be there said the Flipside guys last night at their terrific Anthony Newley evening.

[Si Parallel Universe]

Amazon is showing Dick Lester's The Bed Sitting Room as coming from the BFI on May 25 in both SD and BD. We can but hope.

Fantastic news hope it comes to fruition. I think I will get the BD.