The Pleasure Garden (1953 film)

The Pleasure Garden is a 1953 short film written and directed by James Broughton, starring Hattie Jacques, Lindsay Anderson, and John Le Mesurier.[1]

The Pleasure Garden
DVD cover
Directed byJames Broughton
Written byJames Broughton
StarringHattie Jacques
Lindsay Anderson
John Le Mesurier
Music byStanley Bate
Production
company
Farallone Films
Running time
38 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

Plot

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Filmed among the ruins of the Crystal Palace Terraces, The Pleasure Garden is a poetic ode to desire, featuring a bureaucrat determined to stamp out any form of free expression.

Cast

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Reception

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The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "This light extravaganza by the Californian poet James Broughton, whose 16-mm films (Mothers' Day, Loony Tom, etc.) have been seen over here, was financed by private subscription and shot entirely on location in the Crystal Palace Gardens, a perfect setting. It is a highly personal mixture of lyricism, mime, whimsy and caprice; some may find it too tenuous, but those who like it will like it very much indeed. It has a freedom all too rare in the cinema, and it is all freshly, unassumingly imagined: a real, a genuine lark. Professional and non-professional actors blend homogeneously under the director's eccentric guidance, Stanley Bate's music is full of entirely appropriate gaiety and invention, and Walter Lassally's photography is resourceful and attractively framed."[2]

Accolades

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The film won the Prix de Fantasie Poetique at Cannes in 1954.[3]

Home media

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The Pleasure Garden was released on DVD in the UK by the BFI on 15 February 2010.[4] The release also includes The Phoenix Tower (UK, 1957, 39 min.), a short documentary charting the construction of the BBC's Crystal Palace Television Tower, plus a fully illustrated booklet with film notes, an original review and a history of the Crystal Palace.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "The Pleasure Garden". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 22 July 2024.
  2. ^ "The Pleasure Garden". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 21 (240): 166. 1 January 1954 – via ProQuest.
  3. ^ "The Pleasure Garden". Festival de Cannes. Retrieved 22 July 2024.
  4. ^ Foster, Dave (10 February 2010). "BFI in February". Home Cinema @ The Digital Fix.
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