Actor · Editor · 1930–2017

Anthony Harvey

4: briefs
13:00: average
52 min: in total

On film.briefs4

Caesar and Cleopatra

Gabriel Pascal · 1945

Gabriel Pascal’s 1945 Technicolor film adapts George Bernard Shaw’s 1901 play with near-verbatim fidelity. Starring Vivien Leigh and Claude Rains, it follows Cleopatra’s tutelage under Caesar during the Siege of Alexandria. Lavish in scale but restrained in execution, it privileges dialogue, idea and historical procedure over spectacle or sentiment. Though a financial failure on release, it endures as a rare example of British studio craft applying philosophical seriousness to ancient subject matter.

13:00

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold

Martin Ritt, Paul Dehn, Guy Trosper · 1965

A 1965 British spy film adapted from John le Carré’s novel, following MI6 agent Alec Leamas as he stages a defection to East Germany. Directed by Martin Ritt and shot by Oswald Morris, it trades action for atmosphere, using restrained performances, deliberate pacing, and a muted palette to expose the hollowness of Cold War certainties. Richard Burton anchors a cast including Claire Bloom and Oskar Werner, while Sol Kaplan’s sparse score and Anthony Harvey’s unhurried editing deepen its sense of procedural dread.

13:00

Lolita

Stanley Kubrick · 1962

Stanley Kubrick’s 1962 Lolita is a black-and-white arthouse drama adapted from Vladimir Nabokov’s novel under strict Hays Code restrictions. Starring James Mason as Humbert Humbert and Sue Lyon as Dolores Haze, it reframes the story as a tragicomic romance, avoiding explicit content through irony, voice-over, and visual indirection. Filmed largely in England despite its American setting, it features Peter Sellers in multiple roles and a jazz-inflected score by Nelson Riddle. Though commercially successful and critically well-received, it sacrifices the novel’s psychological and linguistic complexity for viability — making it less a faithful adaptation than a record of constraint.

13:00

Dr. Strangelove

Stanley Kubrick · 1964

Stanley Kubrick's 1964 black comedy, adapted from Peter George's thriller novel Red Alert, follows a rogue American general's order for a nuclear strike on the Soviet Union and the frantic, mostly useless efforts of the President, his aides and a visiting RAF officer, all three played by Peter Sellers, to call it back. Shot entirely at Shepperton Studios on Ken Adam's cavernous War Room set for $1.8 million, it grossed $9.4 million, won three BAFTAs, and is now ranked among the American Film Institute's greatest and funniest American films.