Val Guest was an English film director and screenwriter. Beginning as a writer of comedy films, he is best known for his work for Hammer, for whom he directed 14 films, and for his science fiction films. He enjoyed a long career in the film industry from the early 1930s until the early 1980s.
The Small Back Room is a 1949 film by the British producer-writer-director team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger starring David Farrar and Kathleen Byron and featuring Jack Hawkins and Cyril Cusack. It was based on the 1943 novel of the same name by Nigel Balchin.
Arthur Robin Christiansen was a British journalist, and editor of Lord Beaverbrook's newspaper the Daily Express from 1933 to 1957.
Graham Victor Harold Moffatt was an English comedic character actor. He is best known for a number of films where he appeared with Will Hay and Moore Marriott as 'Albert': a plump cheekily insolent street-savvy youth.
The Killer That Stalked New York is a 1950 American film noir directed by Earl McEvoy and starring Evelyn Keyes, Charles Korvin and William Bishop. The film, shot on location and in a semi-documentary style, is about diamond smugglers who unknowingly start a smallpox outbreak in the New York City of 1947. It is based on the real threat of a smallpox epidemic in the city, as described in a story taken from a 1948 Cosmopolitan magazine article.
Lawrence Michael Andrew Goodliffe was an English actor known for playing suave roles such as doctors, lawyers and army officers. He was also sometimes cast in working-class parts.
Yolande Donlan was an American-born British-based actress who worked extensively in the United Kingdom.
Richard Keith Johnson was an English stage and screen actor, writer and producer. Described by Michael Coveney as "a very 'still' actor – authoritative, calm and compelling," he was a staple performer in British films and television from the 1960s until the 2010s, often playing urbane sophisticates and authoritative characters. He had a distinguished theatrical career, notably as a cornerstone member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, and was once acclaimed as "the finest romantic actor of his generation."
Caedmon Audio and HarperCollins Audio are record label imprints of HarperCollins Publishers that specialize in audiobooks and other literary content. Formerly Caedmon Records, its marketing tag-line was Caedmon: a Third Dimension for the Printed Page. The name changed when the label switched to CD-only production.
Cyril Wolf Mankowitz was an English writer, playwright and screenwriter. He is particularly known for three novels— Make Me an Offer (1952), A Kid for Two Farthings (1953) and My Old Man's a Dustman—and other plays, historical studies, and the screenplays for many successful films which have received awards including the Oscar, Bafta and the Cannes Grand Prix.
On the Beat is a 1962 British comedy film directed by Robert Asher and starring Norman Wisdom, Jennifer Jayne and Raymond Huntley.
Further Up the Creek is a 1958 British comedy film written and directed by Val Guest and starring David Tomlinson, Frankie Howerd, Shirley Eaton, Thora Hird and Lionel Jeffries. It served as a follow-up to Up the Creek (1958), with Peter Sellers not reprising his role because it clashed with the filming of The Mouse That Roared (1959). Frankie Howerd replaced him.
Where the Spies Are is a 1965 British comedy adventure film directed by Val Guest and starring David Niven, Françoise Dorléac, John Le Mesurier, Cyril Cusack and Richard Marner. It was based on the 1964 James Leasor book Passport to Oblivion, which was also the working title of the film. MGM intended to make a Jason Love film series, but the idea was shelved.
Jigsaw is a 1962 British black and white crime film directed by Val Guest and starring Jack Warner and Ronald Lewis. The screenplay was by Guest based on the 1959 police procedural novel Sleep Long, My Love by Hillary Waugh, with the setting changed from the fictional small town of Stockford, Connecticut, to Brighton, Sussex, while retaining the names and basic natures of its two police protagonists and most of the other characters.
A Matter of WHO is a 1961 British comedy thriller film directed by Don Chaffey and starring Terry-Thomas, Julie Alexander, Sonja Ziemann, Alex Nicol, Richard Briers, Honor Blackman and Carol White.
Penny Princess is a 1952 British Technicolor comedy film written and directed by Val Guest and starring Yolande Donlan, Dirk Bogarde and A. E. Matthews. It was made by Guest for his own production company, Conquest Productions. The film stars his future wife Donlan, who was Guest's production company partner, and features Reginald Beckwith, the other partner in Conquest Productions. It was released by General Film Distributors. It was distributed in America the following year by Universal Pictures.
They Can't Hang Me is a 1955 British drama film directed by Val Guest and starring Terence Morgan, Yolande Donlan and Anthony Oliver. It was based on a novel by Leonard Mosley. It was shot at Shepperton Studios near London. The film's sets were designed by the art director Joseph Bato.
The Body Said No! is a 1950 British crime comedy film directed and written by Val Guest and starring Michael Rennie, Yolande Donlan, and Hy Hazell. It was shot at Walton Studios near London and distributed by Eros Films.
24 Hours of a Woman's Life, also known as Affair in Monte Carlo, is a 1952 British romantic drama film directed by Victor Saville and starring Merle Oberon, Richard Todd and Leo Genn. It is loosely based on the 1927 novella by Stefan Zweig. Produced by ABPC, it was shot at the company's Elstree Studios and on location in Monaco. The film's sets were designed by the art director Terence Verity.
Expresso Bongo is a 1959 British drama musical film directed by Val Guest, shot in uncredited black & white Dyaliscope and starring Laurence Harvey, Cliff Richard, and Yolande Donlan. It is adapted from the stage musical of the same name, which was first produced on the stage at the Saville Theatre, London, on 23 April 1958.
