Long-awaited, long-overdue: The Professionals as you have never seen them before. Bodie and Doyle need little by way of introduction, but if the series had at all escaped you since its debut in 1977 their boss George Cowley, head of CI5, couldn't put it more succinctly than his opening gambit: anarchy, acts of terror, crimes against the public. To combat it I've got special men experts from the army, the police, from every service. These are The Professionals . Featuring the perfect ensemble cast of Martin Shaw, Gordon Jackson (completely against type here) and the much-missed Lewis Collins, the series ran for 57 action-packed episodes and made an immediate impact on British and then international audiences which has sustained 40 years. But the series has never looked this good. Painstakingly restored from the camera-original negatives the series could have been made yesterday. No matter how many times you have seen The Professionals, this is a new experience, like seeing it for the first time. FEATURES ON THIS NEW EDITION: Brand-new restorations of the first 13 episodes from the camera-original negatives Brand-new 5.1 tracks from original sound elements Remastered original as-broadcast mono tracks Remastered music-only tracks featuring Laurie Johnson's original scores Photo galleries featuring hundreds of rare and previously unseen images Reinstated original main and end titles Without Walls documentary from 1996 featuring interviews with the creative driving force behind the series PDF material featuring scripts and memorabilia Archive footage featuring additional material, advert break bumpers, US sales trailer and more English HOH subtitles
It is 1795 England and the lovely Catherine (Stephanie Beacham) arrives at the foreboding manor where she is to marry Sir Charles Fengriffen (Witchfinder General's Ian Ogilvy ). Almost immediately upon arrival Catherine is set upon by a series of strange hallucinations and visions involving a severed hand as well as a creepy eyeless ghost. Catherine's sanity to say nothing of her life is threatened as she tries to uncover the source of the supernatural happenings and a sudden pregnancy only adds to the mystery as she slowly begins to find out what dark secrets really exist at Fengriffen! Peter Cushing stars in the blood-curdling tale. As with just about anything he is in Cushing doesn't just carry the film he steals it! As the 18th-century psychiatrist Dr. Pope he serves as a sort of Sherlock Holmes-ish character investigating the claims of ghosts and struggles in vain to find a way to cure with reason what he perceives as Catherine's delusions. Beacham and Ogilvy give solid genre performances but when Cushing is on screen it is simply his film. Veteran heavy Herbert Lom (perhaps best remembered for his recurring role in the Pink Panther series as Peter Sellers's psychotic boss) is chilling in a flashback appearance. Gravelly voiced beatle-browed Patrick Magee makes the most of an underwritten role while Ian (The Saint) Ogilvy and Stephanie Beacham carry the film superbly as the tormented bride and groom.
Perhaps the most easily parodied action series of its era, The Professionals was the one about the gruff but fatherly counter-terrorist top cop Cowley (Gordon Jackson) and his favourite surrogate sons, the curly haired ex-copper Ray Doyle (Martin Shaw) and taciturn-but-pouting ex-mercenary William Bodie (Lewis Collins). As set out by series creator Brian Clemens (veteran of the more fantastical Avengers), their job was to stop threats to the government, visiting dignitaries or the general public "by any means necessary". What this boiled down to was dashing about, leaping out of cars, getting into thump-happy fistfights, leering at every "bird" who passed by as if they were trying to prove something, wearing eye-abusing late-70s leisure wear well beyond the sell-by date, potting baddies with guns hauled out of their smart shoulder holsters, and occasionally choking back manly tears when another of the trio was wounded. All three leads were professionals of another stripe--the sort of actors who could soar with a good script and do their best to sell a weak one--and they were generally set against a parade of top-flight British character acting talent along with sundry sit-com/pin-up refugee disposable girlfriends and suspects. One strange, if understandable, element of the premise is that CI5 tackle all manner of Greek, Middle Eastern, Soviet and radical nutcase groups--with the odd racist Klansman, corrupt civil servant and dubious big business tycoon thrown in to prove they're not fascists--but almost never have anything to do with the Irish terrorist groups who were the main focus of the organisation's real-life counterparts from 1977 to 1983. --Kim Newman
Henry Winkler plays Jack Dunne a troubled Vietnam veteran who has a history of mental problems. He fools his doctor and escapes from the hospital with the intention of starting a worm farm with his fellow veterans. When Jack hops aboard a bus he meets Carol Bell (Sally Field) who is running away from her impending wedding day. While he initially irritates her she soon finds it hard to refuse to invitation to help out on the farm when his plans start to go awry.
A unique collection of some of the seminal 1950's monster and sci-fi movies made by the greatest director of the time including Roger Corman Bruno VeSota and Edward L Cahn. Featuring Monsters vampires delinquent school girls and giant arachnids along with the earliest performances of some of Hollywood's greatest stars. How To Make A Monster: Peter Drummond has been chief of make up at a Hollywood studio for 25 years. When his services are abruptly dispensed with Drummond takes his revenge on the callous heads of the studio by hypnotising a couple of actors and bringing his murderous creations Teenage Frankenstein and Teenage Werewolf to life! The Spider: When a man doesn't return home one night his daughter Carol and her boyfriend Mike go out to search for him. On finding Carol's father's wrecked car by a cave they decide to investigate further. Before they know it the kids have been enmeshed in a giant spider's web woven of course by a giant spider! After finally escaping the eight legged beast's clutches and raising the alarm the spider is seemingly killed and brought back to town. However.... is the spider really dead? War Of The Colossal Beast: A frightened young man races his truck down a dirt road constantly looking back in terror. He is being pursued by some unseen menace! Undoubtedly it is this menace that is responsible for a series of mysterious food truck robberies and the main suspect is the 60-foot tall Colossal Man! Previously presumed dead he is discovered living in a desolate mountain range in Mexico insane and horribly disfigured his face covered in scar tissue and missing an eye. Every effort of communicating with the giant fails and the military drugs him and transports him back to America where he promptly escapes to wreak havoc on an unfortunate city! The Brain Eaters: Strange things are happening in Riverdale Illinois. A huge seemingly alien structure has been found jutting out of the Earth. A bizarre Earth-drilling craft discharges a horde of fuzzy parasitic creatures that fasten themselves to the necks of the townsfolk and control their brains. Sent to investigate the origin of the mysterious object Senator Walter Powers and scientist Dr.Paul Kettering are responsible for stopping the invasion when it becomes clear that the whole town is under the control of the invaders. The Blood Of Dracula: Six weeks after her mother dies Nancy Perkins' father remarries. The stepmother then sends Nancy off to a school for girls where the innocent girl falls under the spell of evil chemistry teacher Miss Branding. Putting Nancy under hypnosis Miss Branding converts the poor damsel to vampirism causing her to commit murders and then forget about them. The villainess recieves her comeuppance when Nancy refuses to snap out of her spell transforming into a slavering vampiric beast.
Owen Daybright has taken the rap for his boyhood pal Les Strobie all his life. Now the foreman on Strobie's ranch he is even willing to accept paternity of Strobie's illegitimate child. Daybright continues to make life easy for his friend partly from high motives - to protect Strobie's wife - and partly from habit. He even dodges bullets and doesn't give his friend up for the heel he is until Strobie negotiates to make off with his father's cattle. An unusual adult Western for its
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