Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

I had not heard of this film prior to its being shown on Channel 81 Freeview recently. I was very much interested in seeing this as I love jazz as well as Classical Music especially Chamber and Leider and Opera so I was looking forward to seeing again on film many of the alumni I had seen in the Flamingo and Ronnie Scott's Old Place in the late 1950s and early 60s before I returned to Wales to do my first degree.I was delighted to see and hear Tubby Hayes - I remember him for playing tenor sax and not so much for playing the vibes as the main protagonist of that art was Bill le Sage who played mostly at the Flamingo.Dramatically, I found the film to be interesting and it moved very well - it was interesting to see the ubiquitous Richard Attenborough playing the millionaire in this film - his range was extremely extensive - it was pity he became a 'darling' in his old age.It did seem odd to see a flurry of jazz musicians flooding through the door of the auditorium - all dressed in the raincoats of the time - The film makes more sense to me now having noted your information that it was based on Othello - I played Brabantio in Othello some 10 or more years ago but I would not have connected this film with that drama.Dave Brubeck was able to give solo piece of a few minutes but Tubby Hayes had only a short time for playing the vibes - and many of the ensemble pieces were interrupted by the acting and the music instead of being in the forefront became only the background. It had not heard the trumpet player previously who was very good indeed - at the time I visited the modern clubs Kenny Baker was well known and also Joe Harriot whom I had the very good fortune to me for supper on evening at the invitation of a lady artist friend of mine - he was so humble and nice I am interested in who played the sax for Keith Michell - I know that he was a painter as well as an actor - and who sang the female vocals I shall do some more research.It was Glenn Miller's music especially the film that introduced me to jazz and my first love was Trad Jazz and I used to go to Club 51 and the 100 Club - after developing an interest in modern jazz I continued to go to the 100 club to dance the Trad Stomp.As I have recorded the film on my DVD player I will watch it again and try to evaluate more as a film rather than a piece of jazz history - it was great to see Tubby Hayes again even if only briefly.I am great fan of 30s music and I love Fred Astaire in Second Chorus the Artie Shaw band is featured and her again there was such a wasted opportunity - Fred could have been singing some wonderful songs with that great band but the opportunity was lost.The trouble in walking down memory lane is that it makes the present passage seem so dire and dirty - London in the late 50s and early 60s was a great place to be for young people - everyone was enthusiastic and polite and much more happy than today.Our politicians have created not so much a concrete but a plastic jungle - roll over McDonald's!

God knows over they years we've had some pretty pathetic actors in English movies - Maxwell Reed, Alan Lake, Michael Gough, Richard Todd, John Gregson, Keiron Moore, Richard Pascoe, Laurence Harvey, I could go on but you get the picture and I'm here to tell you that in this movie Patrick McGoohan makes all of the above look like Michael Redgrave and Donald Wolfit the epitome of subtlety. From his very first appearance all he needs is a sign on his back saying 'I'm the heavy here, Iago, get it?' It's cringe-making to watch and a Master Class in ham. Come back Arthur Mullard all is forgiven. On the plus side we do get to hear some tasty music from the likes of Dave Brubeck and Charles Mingus and Eng. Lit. students can have fun with the links to Othello - Keith Michell, as the Cassio figure is actually called Cass and McGoohan's wife Emily (Iago's wife was Emilia).

The film, based on Othello, is neatly positioned as a vehicle to showcase some of the best Jazz musicians of the period -- including Dave Brubeck and Charlie Mingus.What is most interesting about this film is how it handles racial relations. That was an important part of "Othello", but really defined the 1960s. I love how 1963 was the year of the "I Have a Dream" speech, but already in England films like this had blacks and whites mingling without any sort of trouble. How much more mature they were...The film was released by The Criterion Collection in January 2011, and it deserved to be. Criterion has done a great job of finding lost classics and cleaning them up -- the beautiful black and white cinematography deserves to be seen, and the jazz soundtrack deserves to be heard.

I kind of looked forward to this -- Patrick McGoohan, Charlie Mingus, Dave Brubeck, Billy Shakespeare. How could it go wrong?But it's pretty slow and ultimately unbelievable. When I see a band manager being taunted by a drummer, McGoohan, and becoming enraged while stoned, instead of flinging himself on the couch with three bags of Doritos, there's something wrong. With dialog like, "Do you agree with Margolis that jazz is nothing more than regressive narcissism?", I shiver all over. I couldn't even get hep to the music. It's noisy and represents the most banal form of West Coast jazz. And while the saxophonist could keep up, the trumpeter had no idea of what the hell Dave Brubeck was up to at the piano with his fancy 5/4 time.Brubeck can't act either, though he's not pressed too hard in that regard -- one or two lines. McGoohan CAN act but he's playing a fast-talking hustler and con man here and that's not his strong suit -- not his FORTE, so to speak. He's best at slow, sly, deliberate lines delivered in a clipped voice with odd hesitations as if there are all kinds of wheels turning behind that utterance. Richard Attenborough can act too, but he doesn't put much effort into his role here. There is, after all, nothing to put much effort into.One notable property of this film. If it had been made in the USA, it would have been all about the happy marriage of a black man and a white woman. Racial epithets would have been hurled around. Charlie Mingus, author of "Beneath the Underdog," would have torn off his clothes on the bandstand and run around naked, shouting, "Oogoo Boogoo MAU MAU." But in this British movie, nothing is made of the mixed marriage. Nothing is made of race at all. Refreshing in a 1962 movie. It's not bad, in the sense that it's not insulting. It doesn't treat the audience as a horde of unkempt morons. It's just that it's so much less than engrossing.