Charles DanceFilmography

The Contractor

Actors: Wesley Snipes, Eliza Bennett, Charles Dance, Velizar Binev, Lena Headey, Ralph Brown

Synopsis: Wesley Snipes plays an ex-assassin set up by his old bosses and pursued through London in this action thriller. Former sniper James Dial (Snipes) has carried around the ghosts of his last botched job ever since he failed to kill the leader of a worldwide terrorist group. After leaving the business Read More

Scoop

Actors: Woody Allen, Hugh Jackman, Scarlett Johansson, Ian McShane, Charles Dance

Synopsis: Both laughs and thrills are on the masthead in this comedy drama about a would-be reporter written and directed by Woody Allen. Sondra Pransky (Scarlett Johansson) is an American journalism student who travels to England to visit friends. While in London, she attends a magic show where magician Read More

Starter for 10

Actors: James McAvoy, Alice Eve, Rebecca Hall, Catherine Tate, Dominic Cooper

Synopsis: A working-class English boy who has been fortunate enough to be accepted into a posh private university struggles to realize his lifelong dream while simultaneously winning the heart of the girl he loves in a romantic, bittersweet comedy directed by Tom Vaughan and starring James McAvoy, Rebecca Hall Read More

Fingersmith

Actors: Sally Hawkins, Elaine Cassidy, Rupert Evans

Synopsis: Two women from different worlds are brought together by strange circumstances and forbidden desires in this period-drama. Sue Trinder (Sally Hawkins) was left on her own as a young child when her parents died, and she was forced to fend for herself, living on the street in the company of thieves Read More

To the Ends of the Earth

Actors: Benedict Cumberbatch

Bleak House

Actors: Gillian Anderson, Patrick Kennedy, Carey Mulligan, Nathaniel Parker

Synopsis: A trio of orphans becomes embroiled in a mysterious and long-running lawsuit in this sprawling BBC adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel. A legend in the legal circles of Victorian London, the messy inheritance case of Jarndyce and Jarndyce has been trickling through the courts for years with no Read More

Ladies in Lavender

Crew: Director, Executive Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Daniel Brühl, Miriam Margolyes, Natascha McElhone

Synopsis: Two sisters engage in a subtle war for the affections of a man half their age in this British comedy drama. It's 1936, and Janet Widdington (Maggie Smith) and her sister, Ursula (Judi Dench), are a pair of elderly spinsters who share a home in Cornwall on the coast of England. After a storm, the Read More

Swimming Pool

Actors: Charlotte Rampling, Ludivine Sagnier, Charles Dance, Marc Fayolle, Jean-Marie Lamour

Synopsis: François Ozon's psychological thriller Swimming Pool stars Charlotte Rampling as a mystery writer. When Sarah (Rampling) is offered the use of her publisher's vacation home, she accepts the offer. The conservative, repressed Sarah clashes with the house's other inhabitant, Julie (Ludivine Read More

Henry VIII

Actors: Ray Winstone

Synopsis: The life of one of Great Britain's most influential and feared monarchs is dramatized in this lavish production, originally produced for British television. King Henry VIII (Ray Winstone) is a shrewd but ruthless ruler who is determined to sire a male heir who will succeed him on the throne. Read More

Black and White

Actors: Robert Carlyle, Charles Dance, Kerry Fox, Colin Friels, Ben Mendelsohn

Synopsis: Directed by Craig Lahiff, Black and White is a story about bigotry, social injustice, and a real-life murder trial that made Australian headlines in the late '50s. On a December afternoon in 1958, the body of a nine-year-old white girl is discovered in a cave off the coast of Southern Australia. Read More

Ali G Indahouse

Actors: Sacha Baron Cohen, Michael Gambon

Synopsis: Britain's satirist-of-all-trades Ali G (aka Sacha Baron Cohen) makes his feature-film debut with this gross-out comedy set against the backdrop of the House of Parliament. Where his British and U.S. TV shows had him conducting absurd interviews with real-life politicians and lawmakers, Ali G Read More

Dark Blue World

Actors: Krystof Hádek, Ondrej Vetchý, Tara Fitzgerald, Oldrich Kaiser, Charles Dance

Synopsis: The friendship of two men is tested by war, political upheaval, and romantic rivalry in this drama from Czech filmmaker Jan Sverak, whose Kolya became an international success. Lt. Franta Slama (Ondrej Vetchy) is a top pilot in the Czech Air Force who is assigned to train a promising young flier Read More

Gosford Park

Actors: Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon, Kristin Scott Thomas, Jeremy Northam, Bob Balaban, Alan Bates, Richard E. Grant, Helen Mirren, Eileen Atkins, Emily Watson

Synopsis: Maverick American filmmaker Robert Altman takes a witty and absorbing look at the foibles of the British class system in this intelligent murder mystery set in the early '30s. Sir William McCordle (Michael Gambon) and his wife Lady Sylvia (Kristin Scott Thomas) are a pair of wealthy British Read More

Jurij

Actors: Rajmund Onodj, Charles Dance, Eszter Mazany, Sarah Miles, Fabrizia Sacchi

Nicholas Nickleby

Actors: Charles Dance, James D'Arcy, Sophia Myles

Synopsis: This 2000 TV miniseries is based on an 1839 Charles Dickens novel, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. The film begins with the burial of Mr. Nickleby beneath snow-covered earth. Attending are Nickleby's wife and teenage children, Nicholas (James D'Arcy) and Kate (Sophia Myles). Because Read More

Don't Go Breaking My Heart

Actors: Anthony Edwards, Jenny Seagrove, Charles Dance, Frank, Jane Leeves

Synopsis: Several American stars add marquee value to this British comedy about a single mom who's back in the dating game, whether she likes it or not. Jenny Seagrove plays Suzanne, a recently widowed woman in her 30's with two children, teenage son Ben (Ben Reynolds) and younger daughter Natalie (Ace Read More

Hilary and Jackie

Actors: Emily Watson, Rachel Griffiths, James Frain, David Morrissey, Charles Dance

Synopsis: Perhaps inspired by the success of biopics like Shine and Amadeus, this film based on a true story -- and a book (entitled A Genius in the Family) -- also focuses on the destructive forces of being a musical genius. Hilary and Jacqueline du Pré are gifted sisters who grow up in England in the Read More

The Blood Oranges

Actors: Charles Dance, Colin Lane, Sheryl Lee, Laila Robins, Rachael Bella

Synopsis: In this erotic drama, a couple who have devoted themselves to sexual freedom discover that their open relationship may have led them into dangerous waters. Fiona (Sheryl Lee) and Cyril (Charles Dance) are a married couple with an open relationship; they allow each other to pursue erotic pleasures Read More

In the Presence of Mine Enemies

Actors: Armin Mueller-Stahl, Elina Löwensohn, Don McKellar, Charles Dance, Chad Lowe

Synopsis: Rod Serling's sobering drama, originally shown on Playhouse 90, is re-made in this made-for-cable movie. The setting is the Warsaw Ghetto in 1943, where Jews are either carted off to Nazi death camps or left to die in the disease-ridden squalor of the streets. Armin Mueller-Stahl stars as Rabbi Read More

Rebecca

Synopsis: Based on Daphne du Maurier's Gothic novel, this romantic made-for-television drama centers on the beautiful young bride of the much older, recently widowed Maxim De Winter. A middle-class lass, unschooled in aristocratic ways, the young bride finds herself at sea in a world where social skills are Read More

Space Truckers

Actors: Dennis Hopper, Stephen Dorff, Debi Mazar, Charles Dance, George Wendt

Synopsis: Former National Lampoon editor Ted Mann, who scripted this $27 million science-fiction comedy, calls it "the first outer-space road movie." According to Mann, the film has "no scientists, no techies, none of the usual polished, sanitary environments we're used to in our space films. Space is like Read More

Undertow

Actors: Lou Diamond Phillips, Mia Sara, Charles Dance

Synopsis: Lost in a storm, transient Jack (Lou Diamond Phillips) seeks shelter in a remote woodland cabin and suddenly finds himself held at gunpoint by a deranged mountain man who lives there with his child bride. The storm is but the harbinger of a hurricane and though the reclusive Lyle Yates (Charles Dance Read More

Michael Collins

Actors: Paul Hickey, Liam Neeson, Aidan Quinn, Stephen Rea, Alan Rickman, Julia Roberts

Synopsis: The rise and fall of one of the most important and controversial figures in Ireland's struggle for independence is chronicled in this biographical drama. In 1916, the British government ruled Ireland with a firm and cruel hand, as they had for 700 years. When a group of Irish rebels staged a Read More

The Surgeon

Actors: Isabel Glasser, James Remar, Sean Haberle, Charles Dance, Malcolm McDowell

Synopsis: Needles figure prominently in this blood-soaked entry in the slasher genre. It begins as psycho scientist Dr. Stein begins implanting things in baboons. Dr. Theresa McCann, a colleague at the hospital where they both work is suspicious as to the nature of the perverse professors experiments. Those Read More

China Moon

Actors: Ed Harris, Madeleine Stowe, Benicio Del Toro, Charles Dance, Patricia Healy

Synopsis: China Moon is a slick noir thriller, nice to look at, well-acted and directed, but ultimately predictable, even to its "surprise" ending. Kyle Bodine (Ed Harris) falls in love with Rachel Munro (Madeleine Stowe), the unhappily married wife of a drunken Southern aristocrat Rupert (Charles Dance). Read More

Desvio al Paraiso

Actors: Charles Dance, Assumpta Serna, Morgan Weisser, Katrina Gibson, Gladys Rodriguez

Synopsis: A psychopathic building super wreaks havoc upon his tenants in this Spanish-Puerto Rican psychodrama that was entirely filmed in Puerto Rico. A killer on the run. To hide from the authorities he kills the newly hired superintendent of the seedy Paradise Condominiums and assumes his identity. When Read More

Nanook

Actors: Charles Dance, Adamie Quasiak Inukpuk, Georges Claisse, Seporah Ungalaq, Matthew Saviakjuk-Jaw, Natar Ungalaq

Synopsis: In 1919 and 1920, a courageous young filmmaker named Robert Flaherty set out for the frozen north of Canada, Inuit (Eskimo) country, and filmed the first successfull documentary feature Nanook of the North. In doing so, he enormously increased awareness of the frozen wastes in the north of Canada Read More

Last Action Hero

Actors: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Austin O'Brien, F. Murray Abraham, Art Carney, Frank McRae, Anthony Quinn, Charles Dance, Mercedes Ruehl

Synopsis: Arnold Schwarzenegger appears as a pumped-up Shakespearian hero while an announcer bellows, "Something is rotten in Denmark -- and Hamlet is taking out the trash!" This gag sets the stage for the post-modernist action epic The Last Action Hero. The film concerns Danny Madigan (Austin O'Brien), a Read More

Century

Actors: Charles Dance, Miranda Richardson, Clive Owen, Robert Stephens, Lena Headey, Joan Hickson

Synopsis: Set near the end of 1899, as a new century is due to arrive and many people struggle to keep up with an era in flux, this drama follows the goings-on at a medical clinic operated by Professor Mandry (Charles Dance). Mandry appears somewhat progressive to his top student and right-hand man, Paul Read More

Alien ³

Actors: Sigourney Weaver, Charles S. Dutton, Charles Dance, Paul McGann, Brian Glover

Synopsis: Acclaimed director David Fincher's promising career was lucky to survive this astonishingly wrong-headed, almost universally despised second sequel to Alien (1979). The film careens into oblivion virtually from the beginning, as Lt. Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) is the only survivor of a Read More

Kalkstein

Actors: Charles Dance, Aleksander Bardini, Fabio Bussotti

Synopsis: Years after the fact, a surveyor tells a story to his friends over dinner about an experience he had while surveying a remote mountain site: The terrain there is forbidding, and a storm comes up, so the surveyor seeks shelter in the first place he can find it. This turns out to be the home of a Read More

Tales of the Unexpected

Synopsis: This video is made up of four mini-thrillers from a popular television anthology series. The first is "People Don't Do Such Things," about a soured marriage; "Youth from Vienna," centering on a fountain of youth that gives unexpected results; "Skeleton in the Cupboard," about a man with a terrible Read More

Darlings of the Gods

Actors: Anthony Higgins, Mel Martin, Jerome Ehlers, Rhys McConnochie, Anthony Hawkins

Synopsis: Adapted from the book Garry O'Connor, the two-part Australian TV movie Darlings of the Gods tells the story of the benighted romance between stage and film stars Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh. Anthony Higgins and Mel Martin look and sound so much like the very famous characters they're playing Read More

Golden Eye

Synopsis: This British TV movie was first telecast as Golden Eye: The Secret Life of Ian Fleming. While it should not be confused with either the 1996 James Bond epic Goldeneye or the 1989 made-for-cable The Secret Life of Ian Fleming, there are certain story elements common to all three properties. Read More

The Phantom of the Opera

Actors: Jean-Pierre Cassel, Ian Richardson, Burt Lancaster, Teri Polo, Charles Dance

Synopsis: This adaptation of Gaston Leroux's indefatigable "grand guignol" piece The Phantom of the Opera stars British actor Charles Dance as Erik the Phantom. This adaptation by playwright Arthur Kopit soft-pedals the horrific elements of the story to concentrate on the love the tragic Erik bears toward Read More

Pascali's Island

Actors: Ben Kingsley, Charles Dance, Helen Mirren, George Murcell, Sheila Allen

Synopsis: The year is 1908; after centuries of unchecked power, the Ottoman empire is rapidly crumbling. As a result, Turkey's secret agents--those that haven't already been eliminated by downsizing or death--operate in a vacuum, their superiors knowing little and caring less about their activities. One Read More

White Mischief

Actors: Greta Scacchi, Charles Dance, Sarah Miles, Joss Ackland, John Hurt

Synopsis: Based on one of the most scandalous murders in British history, White Mischief transpires in Kenya at a time just before the beginning of World War II. Jock Broughton (Joss Ackland) is a wealthy rancher who becomes taken with a young gold-digger named Diana (Greta Scacchi). Even though he is fully Read More

Hidden City

Actors: Charles Dance, Cassie Stuart, Bill Paterson, Richard E. Grant, Alex Norton

Synopsis: James Richards is an ordinary middle-class man living a very comfortable and orderly life in London, working as a statistician. In this drama, he discovers that his safe and cozy world is rife with hidden corners and unimagined dangers. He first discovers that things are not as they seem when Read More

Rikky and Pete

Actors: Stephen Kearney, Nina Landis, Tetchie Agbayani, Bill Hunter, Bruno Lawrence

Synopsis: In the wake of their surprise hit Malcolm, Australian screenwriter/photographer David Parker and director Nadia Tass concocted an equally delightful follow-up, Rikky & Pete. Rikky (Nina Landis) and her brother Pete (Stephen Kearney), feeling like misfits in their hometown (as indeed they are) Read More

Out of the Shadows

Actors: Alexandra Paul, Charles Dance, Michael J. Shannon, David de Keyser

Synopsis: In this drama, set in the Greek islands, an Interpol agent assists an American embassy worker who is accused of murder. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Good Morning, Babylon

Actors: Vincent Spano, Joaquim de Almeida, Greta Scacchi, Omero Antonutti

Synopsis: The always innovative Taviani Brothers pay homage to another unique filmmaker, D. W. Griffith, in Good Morning, Babylon. Vincent Spano and Joaquim de Almeida star as Nicola and Andrea Bonnano, the latest in a long line of Tuscany-born cathedral builders. Emigrating to America, the brothers settle Read More

Out on a Limb

Actors: Shirley MacLaine, Charles Dance, John Heard, Anne Jackson, Jerry Orbach

Synopsis: Actress/author Shirley MacLaine described her 1983 book Out on a Limb as the tale of her "personal spiritual quest." In this two-part TV-movie adaptation of the book, MacLaine plays herself, meeting the emotional challenge of passing 40 by entering into an affair with a Socialist member of the Read More

The Golden Child

Actors: Eddie Murphy, Charles Dance, Charlotte Lewis, Victor Wong, J.L. Reate

Synopsis: Eddie Murphy followed up his Beverly Hills Cop success with this fantasy adventure that plops him right into the land of Ray Harryhausen and Indiana Jones. The plot revolves around a God-like youngster (J.L. Reate) known as a "golden child," who has been sent to Tibet to bring the gift of Read More

The Secret Servant

Synopsis: In this suspenseful drama, a British spy goes head-to-head with a Soviet agent to see who can be the first to retrieve top secret documents before nuclear arms negotiations begin. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

The McGuffin

Actors: Charles Dance, Brian Glover, Ritza Brown, Francis Matthews, Phyllis Logan

Synopsis: In this standard suspense thriller, Paul Hatcher (Charles Dance) has a habit of spying on the neighbors across the way, something that gets him into deep trouble. Hatcher is a movie critic, and for awhile it looks like his main problem is keeping reality and the silver screen separate. But then a Read More

Time for Murder

Actors: Claire Bloom, Sylvia Syms, Charles Dance, Amanda Root, Trevor Howard

Synopsis: Presented by Britain's Granada Television, the weekly anthology Time for Murder consisted of six hour-long dramas with the emphasis on mystery and mayhem. Among the authors represented herein were such literary heavyweights as Fay Weldon and Antonia Fraser. Individual episode titles include "The Murders at Lynch Cross Read More

This Lightning Always Strikes Twice

Synopsis: Trevor Howard, Claire Bloom and Charles Dance are featured in this British suspense/mystery that was made-for-TV. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide Read More

Plenty

Actors: Meryl Streep, Charles Dance, Tracey Ullman, John Gielgud, Sting

Synopsis: Plenty boasts a cast of actors ranging from John Gielgud as an ethical and caustic senior diplomat to Meryl Streep as Susan Traherne, a woman looking for solace and a decent life in the aftermath of World War II. After World War II has ended, along with her work in the French Resistance movement Read More

The Jewel in the Crown

Synopsis: Based on Paul Scott's The Raj Quartet, Jewel in the Crown was an Emmy-winning 14-part presentation of PBS' Masterpiece Theatre. The story is set during the last two decades of British rule in India. The plot is set in motion by the disappearance of British woman Daphne Manners (Susan Read More

Saigon: Year of The Cat

Actors: Judi Dench, Frederic Forrest, E.G. Marshall, Josef Sommer, Wallace Shawn

Synopsis: Saigon: Year of the Cat is a low-budget drama about the fall of Saigon. The film was made for the BBC in 1983. It was one of many television projects that director Stephen Frears (High Fidelity) worked on in the early part of his career. Playwright David Hare (Plenty) wrote the script. Judi Dench Read More

Rainy Day Women

Synopsis: In this drama, set in England during WW II, a shell-shocked officer returns to his home town. There he finds that a woman has been accused of being both a spy and a witch. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Little Eyolf

Actors: Diana Rigg, Anthony Hopkins

For Your Eyes Only

Actors: Roger Moore, Carole Bouquet, Topol, Lynn-Holly Johnson, Julian Glover

Synopsis: For Your Eyes Only eschews the gimmickry and campiness of earlier James Bond films, concentrating instead on telling the story and maintaining suspense. Roger Moore is back as Secret Agent 007, this time on the trail of Soviet spies while he romances the beautiful Melina, played by Carole Bouquet. Richard Maibaum Read More