Writing

Patrick Kirwan

Acting credits

Behind the camera

Convoy poster
5.6

A tale of life on board a Royal Navy cruiser assigned to protect the vital convoys between America and England during WWII.

Convoy

1940

The Chiltern Hundreds poster
6.0

Young Viscount Tony Pym wangles National Service leave on the pretext of standing as a Tory candidate for a local seat held by his family for generations. The request is a ruse to enable Pym to marry his wealthy American fiancee while she's still in England, but his masterplan backfires when he finds himself swept into an election campaign and beaten by Labour's Mr Cleghorn – who is then made a peer. In an attempt to save face, Pym decides to stand again – as a socialist. It all proves too much for the Pyms' loyal, true-blue butler, Mr Beecham...

The Chiltern Hundreds

1949

Ships with Wings poster
6.0

Before the war, a Fleet Air Arm pilot is dismissed for causing the death of a colleague. Working for a small Greek airline when the Germans invade Greece, he gets a chance to redeem himself and rejoin his old unit on a British carrier. This is regarded the last of the conventional, rather stiff 1930's style Ealing war films, to be succeeded by much more realism and better storytelling.

Ships with Wings

1941

The Dark Eyes of London poster
5.8

Insurance agent-physician collects on policies of men murdered by a disfigured resident of the home for the blind where he acts as doctor-on-call.

The Dark Eyes of London

1939

The Fake poster
5.9

Someone is stealing priceless paintings from the great museums of the world and replacing them with nearly flawless forgeries. Leonardo da Vinci's "Madonna and Child" is being shipped to London's Tate Gallery for a special exhibition, and Paul Mitchell is assigned to protect it. Upon the painting's arrival, Paul realizes it has been switched. Eager to collect the museum's $50,000 reward, he teams up with Mary Mason, a Tate employee, to recover the original.

The Fake

1953

The Arsenal Stadium Mystery poster
7.2

During a charity football match between Arsenal and touring amateur side Trojans, the Trojan's new star player collapses and dies. Inspector Slade of Scotland Yard is called in and declares it was murder. It takes all his ingenuity and another death before the motive is discovered and the killer revealed.

The Arsenal Stadium Mystery

1939

Hotel Sahara poster
5.8

In World War II, desert hotel proprietors Emad and Yasmin are caught between the warring armies and have to constantly shift their political allegiance to whichever army happens to control the area.

Hotel Sahara

1951

Bulldog Drummond at Bay poster
6.3

Drummond goes up against foreign agents who are trying to steal plans for a top-secret aircraft.

Bulldog Drummond at Bay

1937

Jacqueline poster
6.3

Jacqueline is the daughter of Belfast shipyard worker Mike McNeil. The worker's worth is compromised by his crippling fear of heights. Dismissed from his job, he finds solace in the bottle. All seems hopeless until Jacqueline breaks through her father's self-imposed gloom and helps him to regenerate. An adaptation of the novel 'A Grand Man', by Catherine Cookson.

Jacqueline

1956

The Day Will Dawn poster
6.0

When Hitler invades Poland, sports journalist Colin Metcalfe (Hugh Williams) is unexpectedly reassigned as a foreign correspondent in Norway. En route, his ship is attacked by a German U-boat, but his warning to the Royal Navy is dismissed and he loses his post. With the German invasion of Norway soon after, Metcalfe returns, determined to uncover enemy operations and strike back against the occupiers.

The Day Will Dawn

1942

This Other Eden poster
7.0

A small town plans to erect a monument in memory of an IRA rebel killed during the 1920s. The son of the English Colonel who killed the rebel objects to this.

This Other Eden

1959

The Twenty Questions Murder Mystery poster
6.0

The story evolves around a radio panel game show "Twenty Questions." The panel is challenged with an anonymous question. The answer leads to a series of murders in which the killer uses the programme to name his victims in advance. Two reporters spot a link between them and enlist the aid of the panel in trapping the guilty party.

The Twenty Questions Murder Mystery

1950

Johnny Nobody poster
6.6

When the atheistic ranting of Irish-American author James Mulcahy upsets the inhabitants of the Irish village to which he has retired, a mob threatens him. But moments after he has dared God to strike him dead, a stranger appears and does so. The man, dubbed "Johnny Nobody" by the press, claims no knowledge of Mulcahy or even of himself. He asks the help of the village priest, Father Carey, in his upcoming trial for Mulcahy's murder. While the amnesiac Johnny goes to trial, Father Carey mulls questions of belief raised by the case. And then, the good father learns a little more about Johnny Nobody...

Johnny Nobody

1961

The Hellions poster
6.7

Luke Billings (Lionel Jeffries) and his family have a problem with the new police sergeant Sam Hargis (Richard Todd) so they take over a small Transvaal town with the attention of drawing Hargis into a showdown. Hargis tries to get back up from the townsfolk who do not want to know, so is forced to lay low. As things get out of hand one of the Billings boys takes an interest in the storekeeper's wife, Priss Dobbs (Anne Aubrey). Having had enough her husband, Ernie (Jamie Uys) takes up the gun and heads down the main street alone. An act that prompts Hargis to join him. Slowly, the townsfolk turn up to back them up.

The Hellions

1961

Queer Cargo poster
10.0

The Captain of a tramp steamer is forced by his ship's owner to smuggle some priceless pearls, and take them to Singapore.

Queer Cargo

1938

On the Night of the Fire poster
5.4

A barber gives in to temptation and steals some money, leading to blackmail and murder.

On the Night of the Fire

1939

Tommy the Toreador poster
5.3

Tommy is a happy sailor, travelling the world, singing his favourite songs. When he visits Spain, he gets mistaken for a famous bullfighter. Tommy finishes up in the bull-ring facing a VERY angry bull and cheered on by the crowd. What will he do now?

Tommy the Toreador

1959

Farewell Again poster
6.5

Farewell Again is a multiplotted British comedy/drama about soldiers on leave and the people they've left. Given a six-hour pass after a tour of duty in India, several British Tommies (among them Robert Newton, Sebastian Shaw and Anthony Bushell) try to unravel their domestic tribulations before having to ship out again. American expatriate Tim Whelan was the directorial hand who kept the various plot threads from entangling, while another Hollywood vet, James Wong Howe, manned the cameras. The film became instantly dated with the advent of World War II, but in its own time Farewell Again was a box-office smash. The film was issued in the US as Troopship.

Farewell Again

1937

Unpublished Story poster
6.5

Morale-boosting story released in the middle of World War II. A journalist uncovers a peace organisation at the centre of disreputable dealings.

Unpublished Story

1942

Wings over Africa poster
8.0

Two prospectors in Africa, Tony Cooper and Dalton come across a skeleton that has nearly been picked clean by vultures. They find a letter on the body addressed to a clerk in London named Wilkins . Cooper goes to Wilkins in London and tells him that his brother, whose body they had found, has left a map and a deed to a large diamond mine. Wilkins decides to go to Africa with Cooper to find the mine and, in order to speed up and finance their venture, they give a third interest to Carol Reade and her partner John Trevor), who operate a barnstorming airplane service. In Africa, close to the mine location, they are greeted by some tough gentlemen named Collins and Quincy who have terrorized the natives and lorded over the region, who quickly discover the reason for the party's mission. They join, unasked, in the race for the diamonds. The race is interrupted by the death of Trevor who is found knifed in his bunk.

Wings over Africa

1936

Desperate Moment poster
6.5

Story of a Dutchman's flight across post-war Germany trying to locate the man who alone can clear him of a false murder charge. (BFI Website)

Desperate Moment

1953

No artwork available
5.0

An Irish codger, 110, wants a piece of the action for doing a British producer's TV show.

Broth of a Boy

1959

A Tale of Five Cities poster
5.0

An Englishman has been working in the US so long he now speaks with an American accent. He is drafted into the British Army during WWII but is injured and loses his memory. Because he talks like an American, the doctors repatriate him to the States where he is housed with a New York family. After the war they all travel throughout Europe, searching for the women he still remembers in the hope of restoring his lost memory

A Tale of Five Cities

1951

Once Upon a Dream poster
6.8

An officer's wife has a romantic dream about her husband's man (servant) and comes to believe it is true. Meanwhile the husband has asked his servant to help him, after the war, to suggest ways to ignite the romance he and his wife had before the war, as well as find a way to make money in a post-war economy.

Once Upon a Dream

1949