[Bluray]

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/showbiz/...s-aged-77.html

Maybe not the best director ever but still a great character nonetheless.

Of all his films, Death Wish is possibly his best.

R.I.P.

[lil lexie]

oh, that's very sad. I liked Micheal Winner, he made some wonderfully bad films and was a great raconteur.

[mike65]

The Jokers and Hannibal Brooks are my favourites.

[Beanybun]

I'll never forget whatsisname...

[Johnbee]

He was a very engaging chartacter. I enjoyed hearing him offer to pay for the film to be put in the camera at the scene of the crime involving the killing of Stephen Lawrence by racists.

He made perhaps the worst remake in film history with his bad film of The Big Sleep. However, many people must have enjoyed his films because they made some money and made him rich, so good on him for that.

[degsyhufc]

Originally Posted by Beanybun

I'll never forget whatsisname...

You know, the guy from the adverts

[Chief_Wahoo]

When I see the name Michael Winner,I think of Death Wish (which looks seriously lame now).I'm sure he did a lot more than that,but he lived the best part of his career on that paycheck.

Just had a quick look on his IMDB page,and very little else stands out.

I always liked the snippets of interviews I saw him in though and heard many an anecdote about his ego and eccentricity.

I think he would would have been really good as a character actor.

[Ted Cunterblast]

Not really my favorite director, but like some people have said he was a character.

This is my all time favorite Winner moment...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RS5S2Dio2_Y

[rfonzo]

I would like to offer my condolences to Michael Winner's family and friends. May he rest in peace.

[intruder2k]

Originally Posted by Chief_Wahoo

When I see the name Michael Winner,I think of Death Wish (which looks seriously lame now).I'm sure he did a lot more than that,but he lived the best part of his career on that paycheck.

Just had a quick look on his IMDB page,and very little else stands out.

I'm sorry but this is sheer ignorance. Just because YOU only know him for one film (which is a stone cold classic, by the way) doesn't mean anything.

Winner was at the top of his game for a long time in the late '60s/early '70s and was highly enough regarded by Hollywood to be offered directing jobs on James Bond and The French Connection, among others - jobs which HE turned down in order to make films HE wanted.

He directed horror films, literary adaptations, remakes, gangster films, thrillers and comedies. He worked with huge stars including Brando and Mitchum. His films may have tailed off during the 1980s but he still leaves a body of hugely entertaining work behind him. He and Ken Russell were the twin enfant terribles of their day, challenging the censors and pushing the boundaries of taste and decency.

He's not a favourite of mine but to say he lived the best part of his career on Death Wish's paycheque is ludicrous.

[Inkblot]

I like the story that one of his first films was This Is Belgium, filmed on location in East Grinstead. On Radio 4 yesterday Barry Norman said "I don't think he was a particularly good director... but he was an extremely good producer." He was able to work with an amazing number of respected actors because he knew how to make money, even if the films weren't critically acclaimed.

As far as I can remember, The Jokers was the first film I ever saw at the cinema unaccompanied by adults. A friend and I sat through it twice, and were roundly told off by his mother for staying out too late.

[gemma-the-husky]

How on earth was he so loaded?

all from Death Wish?

[Straker]

Originally Posted by Beanybun

I'll never forget whatsisname...

Rarely seen but excellent Ollie Reed flick. INFW, Death Wish, The Mechanic and The Stone Killer (awesome Roy Budd soundtrack on this) are his finest pictures.

He made some clunkers (what director hasn’t?) but he was far from the hack he was all too often portrayed as. It speaks well of the man that he accepted that criticism with an amused tolerance where other directors would not have been so gracious.

[balthasar]

I always remember how he stood up against censorship in the 1980's.

As others have said " A Michael Winner Film" ranged from the good to the downright awful.

[RedSnapper]

I can remember Hannibal Brooks being on regulalrly when I was growing up - I used to love that film havent seen it on for ages.........cue someone to tell me it was on this week.

[Grabid Rannies]

People can scoff all they like, but Dirty Weekend is a real pleasure for me, and without a trace of guilt. The mordant humour hits exactly the required note and I think it's a very accomplished, and vastly underrated, British flick.

I agree with others that The Stone Killer is probably one of, if possibly not his finest in terms of overall sleekness and credibility.

The Sentinel, widescreen and uncut is far more ghoulish and gleefully exploitative fun than I remembered from a third or fourth generation copy of the completely spineless American TV version that was all that was available here on video for years.

RIP Michael. Along with Ken Russell's demise, that's the last of the English true film world characters gone. I'll never forget!

[JCR]

Originally Posted by balthasar

I always remember how he stood up against censorship in the 1980's.

As others have said " A Michael Winner Film" ranged from the good to the downright awful.

If I recall correctly there was an urban legend bbfc director from 1975-98 James Ferman hated Winner and cut his films purely because it amused him to send Winner a cuts list, though who knows if that is true.

[Grabid Rannies]

Originally Posted by JCR

If I recall correctly there was an urban legend bbfc director from 1975-98 James Ferman hated Winner and cut his films purely because it amused him to send Winner a cuts list, though who knows if that is true.

There may be an element of truth to that, in that Winner certainly was not shy and retiring in his disdain for some of the BBFC's decisions and demands, especially so during Ferman's tenure and with the whole Death Wish II furore. Although Ferman passed the theatrical version of Dirty Weekend uncut, despite it having been prime material for him to tear to censorial pieces, and subject of some degree of public fuss and bother; and the video release only suffered cuts as it was one of a handful of delayed casualties from the fallout of the James Bulger/Child's Play 3 renewed tabloid hysteria frenzy around 'video nasties' (Beyond Bedlam suffered a similar fate). To much dismay, the uncut version seems unlikely to ever surface on DVD; which means I'm consigned to digitising my old pan-and-scan Sky TV broadcast for content integrity

[Johnny Clay]

Originally Posted by RedSnapper

I can remember Hannibal Brooks being on regulalrly when I was growing up - I used to love that film havent seen it on for ages.........cue someone to tell me it was on this week.

Same here. Would be nice to see it back again on the telly. Sad to hear some twonk reporter on Radio 5 describe it as a comedy. BBC - either do your homework or don't bloody bother, eh.

Originally Posted by Grabid Rannies

The Sentinel, widescreen and uncut is far more ghoulish and gleefully exploitative fun than I remembered from a third or fourth generation copy of the completely spineless American TV version that was all that was available here on video for years.

As much as any other,The Sentinel highlights Winner's modus operandi of 'crude but effective'. Hiring people with real facial deformities for the finale showed the old opportunist hadn't lost his touch either.

Winner tailed off in the eighties, but for a long stretch previous he'd been a good purveyor of solid 'thick ear' thrillers that still stand (Scorpio, The Mechanic). His eating out column in the Times was a guilty pleasure too.

Maybe no genius, but certainly a character, and a good one at that.

[mike65]

ha "thick ear" its been a long time since I saw that phrase used to describe action cinema.

I trust when some channel uns a Winner flick it'll be one of his better outings and not something like Chorus of Disapproval or that Agatha Christie film.

[Straker]

ITV just re-ran the Piers Morgan interview from 2010. Winner was on good form but that pillock Morgan spent barely 10 minutes on his film career with the rest on Winner’s personal life, at one point encouraging the audience in getting him to name the date for his marriage. You can always rely on ITV to choose the low-road.

[Bluray]

Originally Posted by mike65

ha "thick ear" its been a long time since I saw that phrase used to describe action cinema.

I trust when some channel uns a Winner flick it'll be one of his better outings and not something like Chorus of Disapproval or that Agatha Christie film.

I had high-ish hopes for Appointment With Death as at the time I just discovered the all-star Agathie Christie films such as Death on the Nile.
But unfortunately Winner didn't quite grasp the opportunity and make full use of stars and locations.

[Eddie Badger]

I remember seeing his style of directing described as "strictly zoom and thump." Wish I could remember where I saw it, might have been Halliwell's Film Guide or something like that.

[brangdon]

Originally Posted by Grabid Rannies

People can scoff all they like, but Dirty Weekend is a real pleasure for me, and without a trace of guilt. The mordant humour hits exactly the required note and I think it's a very accomplished, and vastly underrated, British flick.

I remember it as being the worst film I saw that year. And that was the year I saw Boxing Helena.

[Grabid Rannies]

Dirty Weekend beats Boxing Helena hands down (haha! the self-making punnery is sublime) as a film concept. It's unbelievable to look back at 1993 and think, re BH, that someone ever conceptualised for the future the prospect of "Oh yeah, that was the year someone tried to get us to take seriously a mainstream film about a woman having her legs and arms cut off to become a sex doll"