Barbara K. Emary

Depressing and realistic family drama about the struggles of unemployment and poverty in 1930s Lancashire. The 20-year-old Kerr gives an emotionally charged performance as Hardcastle, one of the cotton workers trying to make life better. Interlaced with humour that brings a ray of sunshine to the pervasive bleakness, this remains a powerful social study of life between the wars, and was a rare problem picture to come out of Britain at the time.

The Helliwells, the Soppitts, and the Parkers, old friends gathered to celebrate their common silver anniversaries. To their dismay they learn that their marriages may not be valid. On hand are an outrageous housekeeper and a photographer.

Mother Riley takes over a circus on the point of closing down, and makes it a success.

On the death of his father, an eighteen-year old leaves school to take over the family firm in the City of London. Realising the other directors want to keep him in the dark he starts asking questions, and is soon undercover as a down-and-out in a hostel which will disappear if a company building project goes ahead.

An out-of-work comedian persuades a drunken nobleman to join a protest against the closing of a village hall.

Old Mother Riley does the laundry for the dancers in the pantomime "Aladdin", where her daughter Kitty works as a chorus girl. Sneaking a peek at the show one day, Mother Riley accidentally pops up through a trap door onto the stage. Accosted by the angry star, Mother Riley’s belligerent responses have the audience in stitches. Outraged, the star walks out, leaving Kitty to take over the leading role, to great success.

Depressing and realistic family drama about the struggles of unemployment and poverty in 1930s Lancashire. The 20-year-old Kerr gives an emotionally charged performance as Hardcastle, one of the cotton workers trying to make life better. Interlaced with humour that brings a ray of sunshine to the pervasive bleakness, this remains a powerful social study of life between the wars, and was a rare problem picture to come out of Britain at the time.

The Helliwells, the Soppitts, and the Parkers, old friends gathered to celebrate their common silver anniversaries. To their dismay they learn that their marriages may not be valid. On hand are an outrageous housekeeper and a photographer.

Mother Riley takes over a circus on the point of closing down, and makes it a success.

On the death of his father, an eighteen-year old leaves school to take over the family firm in the City of London. Realising the other directors want to keep him in the dark he starts asking questions, and is soon undercover as a down-and-out in a hostel which will disappear if a company building project goes ahead.

An out-of-work comedian persuades a drunken nobleman to join a protest against the closing of a village hall.

Old Mother Riley does the laundry for the dancers in the pantomime "Aladdin", where her daughter Kitty works as a chorus girl. Sneaking a peek at the show one day, Mother Riley accidentally pops up through a trap door onto the stage. Accosted by the angry star, Mother Riley’s belligerent responses have the audience in stitches. Outraged, the star walks out, leaving Kitty to take over the leading role, to great success.

Nazi spies infiltrate a British film studio with the intention of sending coded messages in the films they produce.

A group of very strange men, refugees and casualties of the war, rally round when one of their number is framed by a drug racketeer. Co-opting a well-known journalist to their cause, they scheme to bring the racketeer to justice in a home-made "trial" in the crypt of a ruined church.

A night watchman is being bludgeoned, as a safe is cracked open in the offices of the District Food Controller. A list of wartime foods to be rationed is stolen, and the police fear gangsters are planning to sell the foods on the black market. As the office charwoman, Old Mother Riley's fingerprints are all over the safe, and she becomes the police's number one suspect. To prove her innocence, Mother Riley turns detective, adopting various methods and disguises to track down the villains.