Quicklinks
Top Links
trailers and videosfull cast and crewtriviaofficial sitesmemorable quotesOverview
main detailscombined detailsfull cast and crewcompany creditsAwards & Reviews
user reviewsexternal reviewsawardsuser ratingsparents guidemessage boardPlot & Quotes
plot summarysynopsisplot keywordsmemorable quotesDid You Know?
triviagoofssoundtrack listingcrazy creditsalternate versionsmovie connectionsFAQOther Info
box office/businessrelease datesfilming locationstechnical specsliterature listingsNewsDeskPromotional
taglines trailers and videos posters photo galleryExternal Links
showtimesofficial sitesmiscellaneousphotographssound clipsvideo clipsNews for
The Dam Busters (1955) More at IMDbPro »
2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2006
18 items from 2011
George Baker obituary
9 October 2011 4:05 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news »
Versatile actor and writer best known as Wexford in the TV detective stories
Of all the television detectives of recent years, George Baker's Inspector Wexford, with his mature West Country burr, slight air of fallibility and occasional stubbornness, was the one who seemed to spring from real life rather than an author's fancy. Sometimes ponderous, sometimes wrong, always homely, Baker's Wexford had his affable ex-constable's feet firmly on the ground. The character had a solid, believable family life. The actor, also a family man, had a hand in some of the adaptations that went under the title of the Ruth Rendell Mysteries. Whatever the combination of factors, it gave Baker, who has died aged 80 of pneumonia, his greatest success.
Not that fame was unfamiliar to the actor, whose career had got off to such a promising start back in the 1950s. The British cinema spotted his handsome features almost »
George Baker obituary
9 October 2011 4:05 PM, PDT | The Guardian - Film News | See recent The Guardian - Film News news »
Versatile actor and writer best known as Wexford in the TV detective stories
Of all the television detectives of recent years, George Baker's Inspector Wexford, with his mature West Country burr, slight air of fallibility and occasional stubbornness, was the one who seemed to spring from real life rather than an author's fancy. Sometimes ponderous, sometimes wrong, always homely, Baker's Wexford had his affable ex-constable's feet firmly on the ground. The character had a solid, believable family life. The actor, also a family man, had a hand in some of the adaptations that went under the title of the Ruth Rendell Mysteries. Whatever the combination of factors, it gave Baker, who has died aged 80 of pneumonia, his greatest success.
Not that fame was unfamiliar to the actor, whose career had got off to such a promising start back in the 1950s. The British cinema spotted his handsome features almost »
British Actor Baker Dies
8 October 2011 7:16 AM, PDT | WENN | See recent WENN news »
British actor George Baker has died of pneumonia. He was 80.
The star, who also recently suffered a stroke, passed away on Friday.
Baker made his name in 1955 war film The Dam Busters and went on to star in The Ship That Died of Shame with Richard Attenborough.
He was courted by Ian Fleming to play superspy James Bond but was unable to take on the role due to contractual obligations.
Baker is most well known for playing Tiberius in a 1970s BBC adaptation of I, Claudius, before landing the lead role of Detective Inspector Wexford in popular U.K. series The Ruth Rendell Mysteries in 1987.
Baker met his late wife Louie Ramsay on the show, which ran until 2000. Ramsay died earlier this year.
The star's daughter Ellie, one of his five children, tells the BBC, "He absolutely loved Wexford and he loved being Wexford... and he loved the whole thing. It was a joy to him." »
George Baker, best known for playing Inspector Wexford, dies aged 80
7 October 2011 5:51 PM, PDT | The Guardian - Film News | See recent The Guardian - Film News news »
The actor, who also appeared in The Dam Busters, The Spy Who Loved Me and I, Claudius, succumbed to pneumonia
Actor George Baker, who played Chief Inspector Wexford in television series The Ruth Rendell Mysteries, has died at the age of 80.
The star, from West Lavington, Wiltshire, died of pneumonia following a recent stroke, his daughter Ellie Baker said.
Speaking of her father, shesaid: "He absolutely loved Wexford and he loved being Wexford ... he loved the whole thing. It was a joy to him."
Over a career spanning six decades, the versatile actor starred in countless TV shows including Minder, Bergerac, I, Claudius and more recently New Tricks and Spooks.
He also appeared in around 30 films including The Dam Busters, The Spy Who Loved Me, The Ship That Died of Shame and The 39 Steps. He also formed his own theatre company.
But it is his role as Wexford in the »
George Baker, best known for playing Inspector Wexford, dies aged 80
7 October 2011 5:51 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news »
The actor, who also appeared in The Dam Busters, The Spy Who Loved Me and I, Claudius, succumbed to pneumonia
Actor George Baker, who played Chief Inspector Wexford in television series The Ruth Rendell Mysteries, has died at the age of 80.
The star, from West Lavington, Wiltshire, died of pneumonia following a recent stroke, his daughter Ellie Baker said.
Speaking of her father, shesaid: "He absolutely loved Wexford and he loved being Wexford ... he loved the whole thing. It was a joy to him."
Over a career spanning six decades, the versatile actor starred in countless TV shows including Minder, Bergerac, I, Claudius and more recently New Tricks and Spooks.
He also appeared in around 30 films including The Dam Busters, The Spy Who Loved Me, The Ship That Died of Shame and The 39 Steps. He also formed his own theatre company.
But it is his role as Wexford in the »
Star Wars: the original mash-up movie?
13 September 2011 4:28 AM, PDT | Den of Geek | See recent Den of Geek news »
With the Star Wars saga out now on Blu-ray, Terence looks back at the original 1977 film, and examines the disparate elements George Lucas brought together…
The original 1977 Star Wars film arrived on Blu-ray this week, along with the rest of the original trilogy and its prequels. News of the release has once again brought George Lucas into the center of a fan controversy about special editions versus original editions, and the issue of yet more obsessive tinkering. At the same time, though, the Blu-ray release is also a good opportunity to look back at what Lucas’ landmark first Star Wars film did give us.
Quite simply, Star Wars was the world’s first mash-up.
Originally a technical term to describe the mixing of disparate elements in website design, the mash-up concept quickly spread to music and, with the help of YouTube, to the cutting together of different movies to make something entirely new. »
Video Vault – Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
9 September 2011 5:00 AM, PDT | HeyUGuys.co.uk | See recent HeyUGuys news »
A long time ago, in a living room far, far away (well, Elgin), I remember sitting down to watch Star Wars for the very first time. Now, twenty-odd years, a full franchise and hundreds of pounds worth of merchandise later, I am sitting down to watch it again in anticipation of the saga’s encroaching release on Blu-ray.
The problem with Star Wars, however – and there’s a sentence I never thought I’d type – is that it doesn’t feel like a movie. It feels like so much more than that. A childhood spent mimicking the sound of a Yt-1300 light freighter (not) making the jump to lightspeed; the rush of endorphins that dutifully follows the recitation of the series’ theme music, a deep conviction that Han Solo shot first, and a general aversion to any religion which doesn’t grant you Force powers and a complimentary lightsaber. It »
- Steven Neish
Movie Poster of the Week: "Logan's Run"
24 June 2011 1:11 PM, PDT | MUBI | See recent MUBI news »
With all the recent talk of a Nicolas Winding Refn-Ryan Gosling remake (just yesterday the L.A. Times wrote “A Logan’s Run remake is like Mark Twain’s weather—everybody talks about one but nobody does anything about it”), I thought it was time to revisit the film that, at the age of 11, when I saw it in its initial British release, I thought was the greatest film ever made: a dystopic sci-fi masterpiece with a disturbing hook, stunning special effects (or so it then seemed, just a year before Star Wars) and a fleeting Jenny Agutter nude scene etched in the memory of every British schoolboy of the 1970s.*
Logan’s Run was directed by Michael Anderson, a British industry veteran who had helmed The Dam Busters in 1954 and who, at 91, is now the oldest living director to have been nominated for a Best Director Academy »
The Dambusters Remake Renames The Dog
24 June 2011 1:00 PM, PDT | HeyUGuys.co.uk | See recent HeyUGuys news »
Apparently Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, King Kong, The Frighteners, Bad Taste et al) is a huge fan of The Dam Busters, the iconic 1955 film about the development and deployment of the bouncing bomb, which in 1943 was used to destroy a key German dam. It’s not quite clear what his role in the impending remake will be but he seems to have at least his producer’s hat on, with Stephen Fry (V for Vendetta, Sherlock Holmes 2, Gosford Park) on screenplay duties.
As wonderful a film as the original is, it does have one unpleasant element of which I was not aware until hearing Fry discuss it with Simon Mayo and Mark Kermode on their Radio 5 film review show, namely the name of the dog of the Raf pilot who led the bombing raid, said name being used as a code name for the whole operation. »
- Dave Roper
Hot Rods & Droids: A George Lucas Profile (Part 2)
21 June 2011 11:56 PM, PDT | Flickeringmyth | See recent Flickeringmyth news »
Trevor Hogg profiles the career of legendary filmmaker George Lucas in the second of a six part feature... read part one here.
“After Thx 1138 [1971], I wanted to do Flash Gordon and tried to buy the rights to it from King Features, but they wanted a lot of money for it, more than I could afford then,” stated American filmmaker George Lucas who came up with a creative solution. “I realized that I could make up a character as easily as Alex Raymond, who took his character from Edgar Rice Burroughs. It’s your basic superhero in outer space. I realized that what I really wanted to do was a contemporary action fantasy.” The native of Modesto, California was revisiting a childhood fascination. “As a kid, I read a lot of science fiction. But instead of reading technical, hard-science writers like Isaac Asimov, I was interested in Harry Harrison and a fantastic, »
- flickeringmyth
10 greatest flying movies
21 June 2011 4:04 AM, PDT | Den of Geek | See recent Den of Geek news »
From aerial bravery in Wwi to Tom Cruise in an F-14 Tomcat, Mark lists his top ten all-time favourite flying movies…
This is a personal list, and as such, won't please everyone. I accept that, but I wanted to look at the films that have best represented flying for me over the years.
I've also excluded helicopters in exchange for a festival of fixed wings. But as a person who loves aircraft and flying of all kinds, these are the ones that made me feel the need. The need for speed...
The Dam Busters (1955)
Gosh, what a place to start. For the most part, the film's an historically accurate retelling of the ultimate daring-do of WWII. Richard Todd plays the unflappable Guy Gibson, who lead the amazing 617 Squadron on their secret mission against the dams of the Ruhr valley.
Using the Barnes Wallis (played by Michael Redgrave) utterly inspired bouncing bomb, »
Dambusters Dog Gets Controversial Name Change
10 June 2011 7:55 PM, PDT | MovieWeb | See recent MovieWeb news »
We first reported on Dambusters, a Peter Jackson produced remake of the 1955 World War II drama The Dam Busters, way back in 2006. And we haven't heard much about the film since that time.
Broadcast personality, actor, and comedian Stephen Fry wrote the screenplay for Dambusters, which tracks the true story of how a British squadron attacked three German dams essential to the Nazi steel industry during WWII. Integral to the mission was leader Wing Cmdr. Guy Gibson's black Labrador Retriever, named Nigger, who was the mascot of the Raf 617 squadron.
After much deliberation, Peter Jackson and Stephen Fry have decided to change the beloved dog's name to Digger, and that has a few historian's in an uproar.
This is what Stephen Fry had to say about the name change.
"There is no question in America that you could ever have a dog called the N-word. It's no good saying »
- MovieWeb
Stephen Fry masters Peter Jackson's Hobbit
20 May 2011 2:28 AM, PDT | The Guardian - Film News | See recent The Guardian - Film News news »
Comedian Stephen Fry cast as Master of Laketown in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings prequel
Stephen Fry has been cast as a mayor in The Hobbit movies being made in New Zealand by Peter Jackson, a move widely cheered by fans of the British comedian, actor and writer. Filming began in March on the two long-awaited movies after the project narrowly avoided being moved out of New Zealand, with Lord of the Rings director Jackson at the helm again. Fry will play the Master of Laketown, Jackson said on his Facebook page. The character is said to be smart, but greedy and deceptive. "In addition to his writing skills, he's a terrific actor and will create a very memorable Master for us," Jackson added.
Jackson also announced that Ryan Gage will play the mayor's servant, Alfrid, after being originally cast in a more minor role, while Conan Stevens »
TV review: Dambusters: Building the Bouncing Bomb
2 May 2011 11:27 PM, PDT | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news »
Just like Barnes Wallis's original idea, this documentary was pretty daft
A two-hour documentary about the bouncing bomb? A little second world war background, a potted biography of the inventor, Barnes Wallis, graphics explaining the engineering, lots of footage from The Dam Busters and some CGI demonstrations of what happens if the bomb goes wrong . . .
Dambusters: Building the Bouncing Bomb (C4) had all that, but it also had Hugh Hunt, a Cambridge professor of engineering with a plan to recreate the 1943 attack on the Möhne dam, on a smaller (but hardly small) scale. It was, in many ways, as daft a project as the original idea, which Bomber Harris called "tripe of the wildest description".
Wallis began his experiments with marbles and a washtub. Professor Hunt used a cricket bowling machine and a swimming pool, which gave one a very clear understanding of how hard it is to make a bomb bounce on water. »
- Tim Dowling
The King's Speech puts Elstree Studios back on the map for Hollywood moguls
1 May 2011 6:21 AM, PDT | The Guardian - Film News | See recent The Guardian - Film News news »
Warner Bros, Disney and Paramount thought to be bringing blockbusters to Borehamwood studio in megadeals that will benefit local people
In its heyday it was known as the "British Hollywood" – a world-class film studio where classics such as The Dam Busters and Moby Dick were shot, but in recent lacklustre years Elstree Studios was more likely to have hosted Big Brother than a big star.
Now, however, boosted by the fact that The King's Speech was partly filmed there, the golden age looks to have returned to the Hertfordshire studios once described by Charlie Chaplin as the "home of the British film industry".
After an era of hosting mass-market television shows such as Who Wants to be a Millionaire? Elstree Studios is exploring ambitious expansion plans. It has bookings from three major Hollywood productions, each with a $100m budget, and is inundated with inquiries from film producers worldwide.
As the »
- Dalya Alberge
Geek shows and movies on UK TV in the coming week
17 February 2011 8:47 PM, PST | Den of Geek | See recent Den of Geek news »
Hustle departs, Modern Family season 2 starts in the UK, there's Community, The Walking Dead, 30 Rock and Kevin Costner. It's our UK TV look-ahead...!
We wave goodbye to a too short run of a favourite show and welcome back some older programming for a return visit to our TV sets over the next seven days in tellyland.
It feels like it just began, but Hustle series 7 ends tonight, Friday, February 18th at 9:00pm on BBC1. Albert is featured heavily, and worries are pressing weightily on the eldest of the group of cons with hearts. The series finale sees them helping a pal who's rubbed the Mafia the wrong way. We wouldn't rub the Mafia at all, frankly. But the damage has been done and we'll see if the Hustle crew can make repairs. We'll have a review of the finale as soon as possible.
If you haven't yet had the »
Geek shows and movies on UK TV in the coming week
10 February 2011 9:09 PM, PST | Den of Geek | See recent Den of Geek news »
Spaced repeats from episode one, and there's a bit of Harry Hill. Fortunately, there are also lots and lots of great movies on UK TV this coming week...
Well, we hope you're a movie fan, because there aren't many TV shows to highlight. In fact, all we can point to is some overflow from last week's abundant new starts and returning series.
We missed telling you that the newest series of the prop explosion Harry Hill's TV Burp returned for an eleventh go at its neighbours on the telly schedules. But, not to worry, as it's often repeated and you can catch the first episode when it shows again tonight, Friday, February 11th at 8:30pm, or Saturday, February 12th at 6:50pm. Our hope is that the Heather-look-a-likey has been retired, but we never tire of the Knitted Character, or any pals it wants to bring along to the new series. »
Like, Whoa. The Queeniest of Queens
9 January 2011 9:32 AM, PST | FilmExperience | See recent FilmExperience news »
Whoa! a.k.a. Weekly History of Oscar / Awardage
New series? Maybe. Why do I need gimmicky acronyms? I know not.
Jan 9th the first flight of the Avro Lancaster (no relation to Burt) took place in World War II in 1941. This famous plane, the most successful of British bombers, later had a starring role in The Dam Busters (1955) with Richard Todd in the cockpit. The film was Oscar nominated for Best Visual Effects and supposedly inspired the Death Star climax of Star Wars (see video comparison below). Peter Jackson was prepping a remake in 2009 but obvs The Hobbit (2012) has taken over his life.
Jan 10th Youth sensation Sal Mineo, the youngest two-time Oscar nominated male actor (honored for Rebel Without a Cause (1955) and Exodus (1960) by the time he was 22), was born on this day in in 1939. You can see his Rebel screen test with James Dean and Natalie Wood »
- NATHANIEL R
2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2006
18 items from 2011
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.
See our NewsDesk partners
Copyright © 1990-2013
IMDb.com, Inc.
Conditions of Use | Privacy Policy | Interest-Based Ads
An 
company.