I still remember reading Bader's book when I was growing up. It made a lasting impression on me. I wasn't too surprised when the hero of Dick Francis' new novel recovers from the loss of his foot in Afghanistan at the Douglas Bader Rehabilitation Center(?). I wonder how many people reading the book would remember Bader. Unfortunately, the movie with Kenneth More is never shown on US tv.
shareI stand corrected as I just finished the film on TCM. That's the good news is the running time is approximately 105m as opposed to the running times given here. TCM's running time said 130m which is a great disappointment since I had been wanting to see it for many, many years.
I was surprised to hear Richard Burton had been considered. Can't imagine him in the role.
Running time of 105 minutes? Surely they wouldn't edit 30 minutes out of the film. It's not as if it really drags.
I'm not American, but I read about this sort of thing happening on the TV networks there quite regularly.
Why do they do it?
Maybe not for 105 minutes, but for 3 hrs such as Wayne's The Alamo or Garland's A STAR IS BORN they would in order to have more shows that day. The Alamo's original 192m, widescreen version apparently has deteriorated so badly it can NOT be restored by Robert A. Harris. The only DVD version I"ve seen is the 162m version. I have the original version plus a documentary on tape, but tapes are subject problems such as loss of sound quality.
Roberto Rodriguez of From Dusk to Dawn fame has his own Cable Network El Rey which shows Shaw Brothers films, grindhouse movies etc uncut. The had news is the films are chopped for the same commnercials and promos which are run ad nauseum. The same movies are run ad nauseum with a, for instance, 90m film stretched out to 150m! To make things worse, the Shaw Brothers films have been dubbed into English. The FDTD tv series is also run ad nauseum along with reruns of Starsky and Hutch and The X Files plus Texas Justice. This is the kind of programming attitude that cost Oprah Winfred loyal viewers.