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War and Remembrance from 1998 directed by Dan Curtis
who also directed Berkoff in the film Intruders.
"The
German actors view me suspiciously. An Englishman playing
Hitler? I get the wig on, the false jowls, and then the
famous signature- the moustache, I become him and him me-
the symbiosis of the actor with his part. I walk on the
set and everyone quietens down. This is not a likeness.
This is he." (from Overview, Steven Berkoff, 1994).
Berkoff is very good in his role, and he does
create a good physical likeness. His Hitler
twitches with psychopathic megalomania. A
television mini-series of more than 20 hours (12 DVDs!!).
The Berkoff scenes are full of tension, the other scenes
drag and drag on, Mitchem particularly bad, and Gielgud
too predictable.
Director Dan Curtis also directed Berkoff in the
film Intruders. The director photography iz Dietrich Lohmann
All images from the film.
Expelling the Demon from 1999.
Devlin Crow directs a five minute cartoon.
"Tongue drawn and slaughtered, oral hygiene is reaching new extremes.
The Steven Berkoff voiced bedsit man wages war on own mouth after lecherous
failing. Words fail, so bleed all about it" (Devlin Crow, 1999,
Animate Online click
here).
"The story takes place in a bedroom where, following an
embarrassing sexual encounter, it shows a naked man’s disaffection with
his own tongue. Tongue being the articulator of the man’s voice, has
been his lifetime proxy. But it is beginning to brazenly assert itself
and fly in the face of its owner. The man can tolerate this no more and
a power struggle ensues during which we learn something of the tongues
dubious nature" (from
Expelling the Demon website on Your Cinema,
click
here).
Berkoff is quite good in the role with a stream of consciousness
monologue.
Lindsay Duncan voices the woman.
The screenplay is by A-Soma, the editor is Tony Fish and there is music by Nick Cave, Warren
Ellis and Susan Stenger.
All images from the film,
except the poster from the Your Cinema site.
La Femme Nikita, based on Luc Besson's
French film Nikita, this is the television adaptation. Nikita,
played by Peta Wilson, is an operative for The Section.
The episode
In Between
(2.20) from 1998. Nikita relaxes, but of course her relaxation is
interrupted.
The Section team have
to tackle Abel Goellner, an international financier who makes much of
his money dealing with terrorists. The Section want to hijack the
funds in his various bank accounts.
Nikita is part of a team
pretending to be able to transfer money secretly. They arrange to
meet Goellner, and are initially met by Carlo Giraldi, played by
Steven Berkoff.
He appears to be the financial helper of Goellner. After the
meeting with Goellner, Giraldi passed a note to Nikita.
Nikita has the note checked by The Section and fingerprints reveal the
person to be one of their operatives Charles Sand. The records
state he is dead.
It turns out he was planted in the organisation nine years ago but
despite regular messages from him, he has been ignored and does not
understand why he has not been brought out before.
Operations regard him as an embarrassment and Nikita is ordered to kill him.
She doesn't want to do it...
..but The Section handle
it anyway.
One of the regular Nikita
characters is Michael Birkoff (different spelling) played by Matthew Ferguson.
A good role for Berkoff,
distinguished, but unhappiness and longing for his wife who he has not
seen for nine years, do come out.
All images from the DVD of the
episode.
Brasseye, the episode Science
from 1997.
The spoof documentary series includes celebrities who believe they are in a
real documentary. Steven Berkoff appears for a few
minutes using a hammer to destroy
models, showing the effect of "heavy electricity" which has crushed some Sri Lankans so
badly that some are now only eight inches tall.
He is clearly reading from the
script on the table, and like the other celebrities he
signs a letter to the Sri Lankan embassy complaining
about their lack of action on heavy electricity.
But he is so carefree and happy, and did he really believe some Sri
Lankans were hit by heavy electricity are now only eight inches?
Or was he the only guest on BrassEye who knew he was in a spoof.
All images from the film.
Steven Berkoff
in the Space Precinct episode Deadline
from 1994. Aliens are found dumped with their
organs removed- "heart, liver, all three kidneys".
This is an update of the Burke
and Hare body-snatcher tale, with Berkoff playing
the mad surgeon taking body parts. One of the policemen acts as a
decoy and almost comes under Berkoff´s laser
knife, but ultimately it is Berkoff who dies,
shot by one of his alien body-snatchers.
The series is by Gerry
Anderson who also did UFO in which a young Berkoff
appeared, but unlike UFO the acting of the regulars is poor, but
the audience here is much younger. The effects which try to copy
Blade Runner are at times good. The director is John Glen who
directed various Bond films including Berkoff in Octopussy.
Steven must at times
wonder if the money is worth it.
All images from the DVD of the episode.
"If he was a bit shorter and his teeth were a bit sharper,
he'd make a good Ferengi"
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine from 1993, directed by
Siddig El Fadil.
Steven Berkoff plays
Hagath, a gun runner, in the Business
as Usual episode.
Armin Shimerman as naive Quark (one of his 148
appearances in the series) and Terry Farrel as Jadzia Dax.
Quark has debts and is persuaded to help in arms dealing but
Jadzia disapproves.
Berkoff as Hagath, who supplies the arms, with girlfriend Talura
played by Charlie Curtis.
A happy smiling client.
Berkoff plays the affable businessman
who every so often reveals the real undercurrent of evil.
The episode
features quotes from and references to The Third Man, Taxi
Driver etc.
The director of photography is Jonathan West and the editor
is Michael Westmore II
As with other similar series the back room becomes bloated with 2 executive producers,
1 supervising producer, 1 co-supervising producer, coordinating
producer, 3 producers, 1 co-producer, 1 co-executive producer, 1
associate producer as well as 2 assistants t producers. How many actually contributed to the episode
or the series?
All images from the DVD of the film.
Intruders, a double episode television film on alien abductions. A woman
turns up at a highway restaurant in shock. As the plot
develops it is apparent she is being abducted and
experimented on by aliens
The film suffers from
comparisons with earlier films such as John Carpenter's Starman and Steven Spielberg's
Close Encounters.
The aliens apprar in a few forms, none of them convincing.
Steven Berkoff enters in cowboy costume and a strange accent and
introduces himself as a UFO-ologist (pronouncing it euphologist).
Later he reappears more convincingly in a suit.
Directed by Dan Curtis in 1992. Curtis also directed
Berkoff in War and Remembrance.
All images from
the film.
A Season of Giants
1991, a six hour mini-series made for television. It is also
called La primavera di Michelangelo, and Michelangelo the Last Giant. Directed by
Jerry London.
The main giants of the title are Michelangelo
played by Mark Frankel (left) and Leonardo da Vinci played by John
Glover (right).
The direction and photography of the film is
pedestrian, and the acting of the supporting actors, some probably dubbed
into English, is very wooden.
Steven Berkoff plays Savonarola- he would also play the role in The Borgias from 2011. Here Savonarola administers the last rites.
There are beautiful locations, but these are
hardly used.
The film gives little insight into the masterpieces produced by
Michelangelo and da Vinci. The Mona Lisa is shown face-on with no
focus on details bringing out insights. Compare with the film
Savage Messiah about the painting Gaudier which conveys the beauty of
his work. Above the scientific investigations of da Vinci are
trivialised.
The credits manage to spell Steven Berkoff's name incorrectly.
Cinematography was by Daniele Nannuzzi and Film Editing was by
John A. Martinelli.
All images from the film.
Sins, a mini-series from 1991, lasting more than six hours but it seems
longer. When Helene (Joan Collins) and her brother
Edmund (Timothy Dalton) were children they saw their mother imurdered
by the Nazi Karl Von Eiderfeld (Steven Berkoff). Collins becomes a major
fashion designer, and she succeeds is getting Berkoff
sentenced to jail for life. But he is reprieved and comes
looking for vengeance.
A very slow series, stretching credibility as the children
not only manage to get past two Nazi guards, but also capture their
weapons and kill them.
Collins also marries a composer Eric Hovland, played by
Gene Kelly, who shortly after is murdered.
Directed by Douglas Hickox. Berkoff worked with Dalton again twenty years later in The Tourist.
Berkoff is good as the Nazi "I
only did my duty as a good soldier". Collins
would later appear in Berkoff´s filming of Decadence.
'Sins isn't improbable or
unlikely; it's something grander than that: preposterous, say, or
absurd. At the same time it's not really about what it's supposed to be
about; it's really about Joan Collins and her Valentino clothes. On
Sins, a seven-hour, three-part mini-series, they wear one another…
Sins isn't good, great or uplifting television; it's just
television” (John Corry, New York Times, 31
Jan 1986).
The cinematographer was Jean Tournier and the editor was
Michael Brown.
All images from the DVD of the film.
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