The Woman Eater (1958)

A strange film, a typical 1950s monster film though with a rather slow restrained manner despite the fact it includes a tree which feeds on women. 

Evil scientist Dr Moran (George Coulouris) discovers a tree in the Amazon which feeds on human flesh (of the female kind) and in return provides a serum which can bring the dead back to life (though presumably not half-eaten women).

He brings the tree back to England, along with native Tanga (Jimmy Vaughn) who regards the tree as his god, and feeds it a steady diet of women from the streets of Soho so he can obtain the serum. Sally (Vera Day) gets a job with Moran but soon wants to leave. However, Moran has fallen in love with her and decides to share his secrets with her...

A creepy film with a ridiculously looking tree (though thankfully we don't get to see it much). So many questions of course, why does the tree only want to eat beautiful women? Why did the tribe allow Moran to take their deity away? Naturally nothing really makes sense. Good campy fun.

Women in Blue (1943)

A fascinating if somewhat dated short film showing the training of new recruits to the US Navy Women's Auxiliary Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES). The narrator (Hugh James) explains that the recruits learn how to march and learn important information such as how the Navy is run (unfortunately the narrator was able to resist the temptation to quip "badly"). Then they can take over base duties from men who can be sent into combat (to their universal delight of course).

Dangerous Paradise (1930)

A somewhat clunky early talkie. Heyst (Richard Arlen) is a hermit (though rather well dressed) who has his own island in the South Seas. On a visit to Surabaya he encounters Alma (Nancy Carroll) in a bar who is a rather harassed young musician. The bar owner Schonberg (Warner Oland) makes no secret of his aim to get into Alma's pants so the young girl stows away on Heyst's boat...

Unfortunately some bad men also soon arrive on Heyst's island. They are convinced there is treasure to be found despite Heyst's protestations. Can Heyst and Alma survive this incursion and (obviously) fall in love?

A reasonable little (and short) story though suffers from sound problems at times with the dialogue being unclear or drowned out. The film is interesting to see the future Charlie Chan as a sexual sleazeball.

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965)

An excellent and bleak spy drama, and a very good John Le Carre adaptation. Leamas (Richard Burton) is a burned out spy running British intelligence operations in Berlin. Back in London Leamas is given a new mission to pose as a defector with the aim of discrediting Mundt (Peter van Eyck) of East German intelligence. 

Leamas builds a new identity of a washed out drunk, though enters a relationship with naive young communist Nan (Claire Bloom). Once he defects Leamas is interrogated by Mundt and his rival Fiedler (Oscar Werner). Leamas soon realises that he is just a pawn in a bigger game, and to his horror Nan is another pawn...

A deep and rich spy drama. The inhumanity, grubbiness and cruelty of the Cold War spy game has seldom been better portrayed. Burton's and Werner's performances are truly excellent. One of the best L'Carre adaptations, maybe one of the best spy movies of all.

Rock City: London 1964-73 (1973)

The story of the British rock scene from the early 1960s to the 1970s, well a kind of documentary. It is mostly a series of (mostly) great live performances - and some early music videos - interspersed with interviews.

If we are to be honest a lot of the interviews are not very illuminating (though Pete Townsend's anti-drug stance is interesting, as it comes alongside footage of Brian Jones' troubles). It doesn't really matter as the songs from the likes of the Rolling Stones, Cream, Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Joe Cocker and Jimi Hendrix (and many more) are incredible. 

It is a bit of a hippy-fest, a film of it's time, but what a time.