Event News: BFI Announce OUT OF THE UNKNOWN, THE CHANGES and More

The BFI have today announced a raft of DVD releases for the late summer and autumn, including a number of titles long desired by fans of British cult TV.

OUT OF THE UNKNOWN, the BBC anthology series which ran for four series between 1965 and 1971, is issued in September in a six-disc set, and all extant episodes will be included. Authors whose works have been adapted for the series include John Wyndham, Isaac Asimov, Philip K Dick, Ray Bradbury and J.G. Ballard, and the set is an absolute must-buy for fans of science fiction and vintage television everywhere. Sadly OUT OF THE UNKNOWN, like DOCTOR WHO and many other programmes, was a victim of the BBC’s policy of wiping its master tapes back in the 1960s and 1970s, and unfortunately many episodes of the series are now lost. It had also been speculated by fans that those episodes that do exist were being prevented from a full DVD release by complicated rights issues, owing to the number of authors and their works that had been adapted, but thankfully this appears not now to be the case.

THE CHANGES was a 1975 children’s series based on a trilogy of novels by Peter Dickinson, and shows a technological disaster and its aftermath through the eyes of teenage schoolgirl Vicky Williams. Directed by John Prowse, THE CHANGES was broadcast by the BBC and remains one of those once-seen-never-forgotten children’s classics, and appears on DVD in August.

Also announced by the BFI are the 1978 Play for Today RED SHIFT, adapted by THE OWL SERVICE’s Alan Garner from his own novel and directed by John Mackenzie of THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY, and the latest Peter Greenaway film, GOLTZIUS & THE PELICAN COMPANY. Finally, there is a new release for the classic 1932 Frank Borzage film version of Ernest Hemingway’s FAREWELL TO ARMS.

More details of the releases can be found on www.bfi.org.uk

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