BFI Flipside is a series of Dual Format Editions (

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

and

Blu-ray The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of st ...

released together) which was launched in May 2009 and is published by the

British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery (United Kingdom), National Lot ...

's Video label. The series so far features a total of 65 feature and short films, as well as 10 archive interviews with the likes of

Spike Milligan Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (16 April 1918 – 27 February 2002) was an Irish actor, comedian, writer, musician, poet, and playwright. The son of an English mother and Irish father, he was born in British Colonial India, where he spent his ...

Peter Cook Peter Edward Cook (17 November 1937 – 9 January 1995) was an English actor, comedian, satirist, playwright and screenwriter. He was the leading figure of the British satire boom of the 1960s, and he was associated with the anti-establishme ...

and

Richard Lester Richard Lester Liebman (born January 19, 1932) is an American retired film director based in the United Kingdom. He is best known for directing the Beatles' films '' A Hard Day's Night'' (1964) and '' Help!'' (1965), and the superhero films ' ...

. The BFI Flipside charts "the untold history of British film", and includes performances by such celebrated actors as

John Hurt Sir John Vincent Hurt (22 January 1940 – 25 January 2017) was an English actor whose career spanned over five decades. Hurt was regarded as one of Britain's finest actors. Director David Lynch described him as "simply the greatest actor in t ...

Jane Asher Jane Asher (born 5 April 1946)The International Who's Who of Women, 3rd edition, ed. Elizabeth Sleeman, Europa Publications, 2002, p. 29 is an English actress and author. She achieved early fame as a child actress and has worked extensively in f ...

Ian McNeice Ian McNeice (born 2 October 1950) is an English film and television actor. He found fame portraying government agent Harcourt in the 1985 television series '' Edge of Darkness'', and went on to feature in popular films such as ''The Englishma ...

Richard O'Brien Richard Timothy Smith. known professionally as Richard O'Brien, is a British-New Zealand actor, writer, musician, composer, and television presenter. He wrote the musical stage show ''The Rocky Horror Show'' in 1973, which has remained in conti ...

, Tom Bell,

, Barry Evans,

Denholm Elliott Denholm Mitchell Elliott, (31 May 1922 – 6 October 1992) was an English actor, with more than 125 film and television credits. His well-known roles include the abortionist in '' Alfie'' (1966), Marcus Brody in ''Raiders of the Lost Ark'' (19 ...

and

Judy Geeson Judith Amanda Geeson (born 10 September 1948) is an English film, stage, and television actress. She began her career primarily working on British television series, with a leading role on '' The Newcomers'' from 1965 to 1967, before making he ...

in films directed by the likes of

Clive Donner Clive Stanley Donner (21 January 1926 – 6 September 2010)Ronald Berganbr>Obituary: Clive Donner ''The Guardian'', 7 September 2010 was a British film director who was part of the British New Wave, directing films such as ''The Caretaker'' ...

Barney Platts-Mills Barney Platts-Mills (15 October 1944 – 5 October 2021) was a British film director, best known for his award-winning films, ''Bronco Bullfrog'' and ''Private Road''. Biography Platts-Mills was born in 1944 in Colchester, England, a son of b ...

John Irvin John Irvin (born 7 May 1940) is an English film director. Born in Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland, he began his career by directing a number of documentaries and television works, including the BBC adaptation of John le Carré's '' Tinke ...

Stuart Cooper Stuart W. Cooper (born 1942) is an American filmmaker, actor and writer. Career Cooper was a resident in the United Kingdom in the 1960s and 1970s where his most notable film appearance was as one of ''The Dirty Dozen'', Roscoe Lever, in 1967. ...

Guy Hamilton Mervyn Ian Guy Hamilton, DSC (16 September 1922 – 20 April 2016) was an English film director. He directed 22 films from the 1950s to the 1980s, including four James Bond films. Early life Hamilton was born in Paris on 16 September 1922, w ...

Peter Watkins Peter Watkins (born 29 October 1935) is an English film and television director. He was born in Norbiton, Surrey, lived in Sweden, Canada and Lithuania for many years, and now lives in France. He is one of the pioneers of docudrama. His films ...

and James Hill. Each BFI Flipside edition includes a feature film presentation that is complemented by additional film content (sometimes a second feature film by the same director, or a selection of short films which are related to the main feature by subject, era, actor or director). Each release is packaged in distinctive artwork which carries the volume number on the spine and with a comprehensive booklet containing informative essays, full cast and credit information, original film reviews and reproductions of original promotional material. The Flipside is dedicated to releasing British film titles which have never been available on any home video format before (though some exceptions have been noted by the label's founder and programmerRugo, D (2011
Those Obscure Objects of (British) Desire: A Conversation with Flipside's Sam Dunn
, Mubi.com 11 October 2011) and all films are newly mastered to High Definition from the best available film materials from the

BFI National Archive The BFI National Archive is a department of the British Film Institute, and one of the largest film archives in the world. It was founded as the National Film Library in 1935; its first curator was Ernest Lindgren. In 1955, its name became the N ...

or from the collections of filmmakers. Each title was originally released on both

and

, but since ''The Pleasure Girls'' in a dual format release.

Releases

A budget-priced DVD sampler entitled ''

Kim Newman Kim James Newman (born 31 July 1959) is an English journalist, film critic and fiction writer. Recurring interests visible in his work include film history and horror fiction—both of which he attributes to seeing Tod Browning's ''Dracula'' at ...

's Guide to The Flipside of British Cinema'' (2010), spine number "000", features a documentary in which the UK's leading cult film expert introduced and contextualized the first nine releases in the series and also included three complete short films as extras -

's ''Carousella'' (1966),

Gerry O'Hara Gerald O'Hara (born October 1924, Boston, Lincolnshire) is an English film and television director. O'Hara was an assistant director on Laurence Olivier's film, '' Richard III''; the Carol Reed film, '' Our Man in Havana'' and the Academy Award ...

's ''

The Spy's Wife ''The Spy's Wife'' is a 1972 British short crime film directed by Gerry O'Hara and starring Ann Lynn, Dorothy Tutin, Tom Bell, Vladek Sheybal and Julian Holloway. Cast *Dorothy Tutin as Hilda Tyler *Ann Lynn as Grace * Tom Bell as Tom Tyle ...

'' (1972) and a short

travelogue Travelogue may refer to: Genres * Travel literature, a record of the experiences of an author travelling * Travel documentary A travel documentary is a documentary film, television program, or online series that describes travel in general or ...

''Tomorrow Night in London'' (1969, exclusive to the release).

External links

Official site

References

{{reflist Lists of British films Flipside Home video lines