Daphne (2017)

Daphne, 31, Londoner. Busy days, hectic nights, friends, people, lovers, are all welcome distractions from the constant and creeping feeling that her life is somehow stuck.

'Daphne' is the vibrant character portrait of a young woman on the threshold of a much-needed change.

Enshrouded with strangeness and defying convention, the work of Daphné du Maurier (1907-1989) has seduced many filmmakers, especially Alfred Hitchcock, who adapted Jamaica Inn, The Birds and Rebecca, one of her most famous novels. This is a subtle portrait of a complex novelist.

First transmitted in 1971, Daphne du Maurier, author of 'Rebecca' and 'Jamaica Inn', talks to writer Wilfred De'Ath about her life from her Cornish cliff-top home. In her first television interview, the cameras follow du Maurier as she walks through her house and its grounds, recalling key events from her life and revealing memorabilia from her famous theatrical family.She also reflects on the inspirations and influences that shaped her writing and shares archived manuscripts of some of her famous works.

In February 2017 Time Out magazine polled actors, producers, directors and movie mavens to create a list of the top 100 British films of all time. Forty-four years after its release, Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now was a comfortable winner. Defined by them as, "a movie whose every glorious frame is bursting with meaning, emotion and mystery, and which stands as the crowning achievement of one of Britain’s true iconoclasts and masters of cinema". Based on a Daphne Du Maurier short story, Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland play a couple who travel to Venice after the tragic death of their daughter. Pino Donaggio as well as composing the score, performed a substantial portion of it himself. He played the piano pieces, despite the fact that he was not very accomplished at playing the piano. These pieces are usually associated with Christine in the film, and Roeg wanted them to have an innocent sound reminiscent of a little girl learning to play the piano. Donaggio claims that since he was not very good at playing the piano, the pieces had an unsure style to them, perfect for the effect they were trying to capture. The song - "I Colori Di Dicembere" - was recorded by Iva Zanicchi and released on her 1974 album "Amare, Non Amare". It is not heard in the film and was only included on the Italian pressing of the soundtrack where it was released as "A Venezia… Un Dicembre Rosso Shocking". This new edition of Donaggio's classic score reinstates the song and reverts to the original track sequence and edit.

"The Austrian conductor Karl Böhm is one of the towering conductors of the 20th Century. As the embodiment of the long Austro-German musical tradition, he helped to write musical history. This 19-CD set assembles all the extant recordings he conducted for EMI (notably its German Electrola label) over the period 1935 to 1949 in Dresden, Berlin, Vienna and London includes a number of rarities and the world premiere release of a version of Mozart’s Serenata notturna recorded in Vienna in 1947.