Cold Lazarus - Enire Series - 2-DVD Set ( Dennis Potter's Cold Lazarus )

Cold Lazarus - Enire Series - 2-DVD Set (DVD) (*)

Out of Stock

Original Title: Dennis Potter's Cold Lazarus
Screened, competed or awarded at:
BAFTA Awards
Other Film Festival Awards

Language Selections:
English ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )

Product Origin/Format:
United Kingdom ( PAL/Region 2 )

Running Time:
221 min

Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen (1.78:1)

Special Features:
2-DVD Set
Biographies
Filmographies
Interactive Menu
Scene Access

Movie filmed in 1996 and produced in:
United Kingdom ( Great Britain, Ireland )

Directed By:
Renny Rye

Written By:
Dennis Potter

Actors:
Albert Finney ..... Daniel Feeld
Ciarán Hinds ..... Fyodor (4 episodes, 1996)
Frances de la Tour ..... Emma Porlock (4 episodes, 1996)
Grant Masters ..... Tony Watson
Ganiat Kasumu ..... Luanda (4 episodes, 1996)
Carmen Ejogo ..... Blinda (4 episodes, 1996)
Henry Goodman ..... David Siltz
Saffron Burrows ..... Sandra Sollars (4 episodes, 1996)
Diane Ladd ..... Martina Masdon (3 episodes, 1996)
Joe Roberts ..... Chris (3 episodes, 1996)
Tara Woodward ..... Beth (3 episodes, 1996)
Rob Brydon ..... Karl (3 episodes, 1996)
Anna Chancellor ..... Anna Griffiths (3 episodes, 1996)
Claudia Malkovich ..... Kaya (2 episodes, 1996)
David Foxxe ..... Andrew Milton (2 episodes, 1996)
James Peck ..... Fyodor's Apartment Guard (2 episodes, 1996)
John Light ..... Student Daniel
Terence Maynard ..... 1st MSC Guard (2 episodes, 1996)
Guy Masterson ..... Police Chief (2 episodes, 1996)
Jonathan Cake ..... Nat (2 episodes, 1996)
Adam Bareham ..... Daniel's Father (2 episodes, 1996)
Rupert Penry-Jones ..... Militiaman (2 episodes, 1996)
Malcolm Rogers ..... Preacher (2 episodes, 1996)
Harry Ditson ..... Harry Schumpet (2 episodes, 1996)
Silas Carson ..... 1st Sentry (2 episodes, 1996)
Jason Salkey ..... 2nd Sentry (2 episodes, 1996)
Donald Sumpter ..... Dr. Rawl
Roy Hudd ..... Ben Baglin (2 episodes, 1996)
Richard E. Grant ..... Nick Balmer
Natascha McElhone ..... Angie (2 episodes, 1996)
Katy Carmichael ..... 2nd Hostess (2 episodes, 1996)

Synopsis:

COLD LAZARUS is the second of two television dramas written by the acclaimed TV playwright Dennis Potter. Having been diagnosed with terminal cancer and with less than six months to live, Potter undertook a race against mortality to complete two television dramas which were uniquely to be shared between Channel 4 and the BBC. In a televised interview with Melvyn Bragg he said My only regret is if I die four pages too soon. He didn t and the result is a fitting tribute to a life committed to the creation of some of the finest television drama ever written. In a future almost 400 years hence, a group of scientists gather to watch the projected memories of a human brain the cryogenically stored brain of writer Daniel Freed. The memories offer a new kind of reality, a new kind of freedom in a world that is far from free. Brutal rebels whose motto is Reality or Nothing take life indiscriminately and armed retaliation by the state can be no less deadly. Under pressure from rival corporate interests, each threatening to pull the plug at any moment, the scientists fall victim to the tricks that memory can play, picking at threads as they try to comprehend how personal histories are written and can be rewritten. As elements of truth and fiction explosively intertwine, will the mind of Daniel Feeld finally be set free?

During a four-day period in contemporary London, hard-drinking TV scripter Daniel Feeld (Albert Finney) has some unusual experiences in which life begins to mirror fiction. Despite pain, Feeld attempts to go about his daily routines but soon learns that his spastic colon is actually pancreatic cancer. He has written a TV drama titled "Karaoke", and scenes from production are viewed in an editing room by TV director Nick Balmer (Richard E. Grant). On the street and in restaurants, Feeld is startled to find people around London reciting dialogue he has written, and this leads him into a relationship with 22-year-old karaoke-bar hostess Sandra Sollars (Saffron Burrows), who has several synchronicities to a character in his script. As Feeld continues to see other striking parallels, he must decide how to protect Sandra from vicious gangster Arthur "Pig" Maillion (Hywel Bennett), another person from the pages of his script. Feeld and others in the four-part Karaoke miniseries returned in a follow-up, the four-part science-fictional Cold Lazarus miniseries. Both Karaoke and Cold Lazarus were written in 1994 by Dennis Potter during the weeks prior to his death. Potter saw karaoke bars as a metaphor for life, as he noted, "Although you use your own voice, the words are written for you." The two miniseries aired on the BBC and England's Channel Four in 1996, followed by the 1996 U.S. premiere at New York's Museum of Television & Radio and a 1997 airing in the U.S. on the Bravo channel.

Dr. Emma Porlock and her colleagues, attempting to unlock the secrets of human memory for the Masdon drug empire, get a cryogenically stored 400-year-old human head to project its memories through virtual reality displays. But Porlock and her team are chronically under-funded, and she may have to go around Masdon to a media sleaze merchant to get the money she needs to maintain the project. But an even more complex world of secret police, RON (Reality-Or-Nothing) riots, and murder is going on outside the lab. And the deeper Porlock goes into the frozen memories of the writer Daniel Feeld, the more twisted the labyrinth of intrigue becomes.

This product was added to our catalog on Friday 15 October, 2010.

Customers who bought this product also purchased

Animal Farm (DVD)

The Egyptian (DVD)