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 If.... (DVD)
Description: Genre: Drama / Theatrical Release: 1968 / Director: Lindsay Anderson / Actors: Malcolm McDowell, David Wood ... / DVD ... more  If.... (DVD) ... released 23 July, 2007 at Paramount Home Entertainment (UK) / Features of the DVD: Black & White, Colour, PAL / The Palme D’Or-winning British classic, If...’s long wait for a DVD release is finally over, and the end result does it proud. Boasting commentaries, interviews and a quality documentary too, it’s a true collectors’ piece for fans of the film. And make no mistake about it, it’s the superb movie that’s the star here. If... is, for those new to it, set in a British public school, and from this setting it has plenty then to say on authority and society. Directed by the late, great Lindsay Anderson, the film centres on Mick Travis, magnetically portrayed by Malcolm McDowell. Superbly marrying fantasy and more realistic elements, If... is packed with iconic, and often quite surreal moments, leading right up the to the famed and indelible ending that sticks long in your mind once the credits have rolled. A strong, powerful influence for many who followed it, If... is powered by Malcolm McDowell’s astounding performance (which would earn him the part in Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange). It’s arguable that he’s never been better than he is here, and he’s in good company, thanks to a top-quality supporting cast too. Perhaps the greatest complement to If... though is that, decades after is initial release, it’s not only recognised as one of the finest British films ever made, but it’s regarded in many quarters as a classic of cinema full stop. And if you’ve not yet had the pleasure, this DVD release finally, belatedly, can open the film up to a whole new audience. Let’s hope it does. --Jon FosterNewest Review: ... motorbikes and messing around with guns. They are completely convincing as intelligent, upper-class adolescents, with their ... more ... ever expanding wall of revolutionary pin-ups and boozy conversations about nothing.
Travis is played by Malcolm McDowell in his first role, and it made a star of him. He's great, with enough of the 'cheeky chappie' about him that you don't mind his character being a bit pretentious. The way he watches other people, and his subtle facial reactions, are the most impressive thing here, more than his acrobatic rebellious antics. I've never understood why he didn't go on to become one of the biggest stars of the 1970s. Th...more |
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If.... (DVD): 'The world will end very soon.' (1095 words)
by hogsflesh - written on 16.04.08 (Very useful, 86 readings)
Rating:
A review of the Paramount DVD. If.... is a classic British film from 1968, directed by Lindsay Anderson (not a woman, in spite of his girly name). It's about life in an absurdly constrictive public school, and three sixth formers who try to rebel against the system. It's very 1960s, but while it sometimes seems a bit gauche, especially in some of its dialogue, it's a lot of fun. It was filmed in a real public school at Cheltenham, where Anderson himself had been taught. The genuine locations help enormously. This feels like a school; even if most people won't have been to an über-posh boarding school there's still something here to ...
by - written on 26.02.02
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With If... Lindsay Anderson reached out to the peak of achievement in the British cinema and made a film which must count as one of the most powerful ever made by an English director. A study of a rebel in an English public school, it showed an individual making a protest against authority, a cry which turns eventually into anarchy and armed insurrection, with parents, masters and prefects subjected to guerrilla gunfire from the rooftops on Founders' Day, an ending recalling Jean Vigo's classic Zero de Conduite, which had more than one resemblance to Anderson's film. The school, with its archaic, meaningless customs, its pseudo-progressive headmaster ...
If.... (DVD): If... The Movie (163 words)
by KSamra - written on 11.07.00 (Very useful, 36 readings)
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If?is one of those films which puts a hook into everyone who sees for any number of reasons. It tells the story of a young adolescent student played by Malcolm Macdowell of Clockwork Orange fame who rebels against the disciplinarian boarding school which he attends in what is a microcosm of the class war which was being waged in the 1960?s in Britain when the film was made. Coincidentally, If? was also made just before the Paris student riots of 1968, and heralded a major crisis in the British education system prompted by various people who thought the film too provocative for the student audience it was aimed at and tried to have it banned. Unfortunately, this action ...
