
Torin Thatcher
Actor · 1905 – 1981 · Bombay, British India, India
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Torin Thatcher (15 January 1905 - 4 March 1981) was an English actor born in Bombay, British India, India), to English parents. He was an imposing, powerfully built figure noted for his flashy portrayals of screen villains. He was educated in England at Bedford School and at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. He worked as a schoolmaster before first appearing on the London stage in 1927 and then entering British films in 1934. He appeared in the 1937 Old Vic stage production of Hamlet, in which Laurence Olivier made his first appearance in the title role, opposite Vivien Leigh as Ophelia. During the Second World War, he served with the Royal Artillery and was demobilized with the rank of lieutenant colonel. Thatcher appeared in classic British films of the late 1930s and 1940s, including Major Barbara (1941) and Great Expectations (1946), in which he played Bentley Drummle. He moved to Hollywood in the 1950s. He was constantly in demand, invariably lending his looming figure and baleful countenance to sinister or stern roles in popular costume thrillers such as The Crimson Pirate (1952), Blackbeard the Pirate (1952), The Robe (1953) (as the disapproving father of Richard Burton's character), The Black Shield of Falworth (1954), Helen of Troy (1956), Darby's Rangers (1958), and The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958). He also appeared in the Marlon Brando and Trevor Howard 1962 remake of Mutiny on the Bounty. He returned to the stage quite frequently, notably on Broadway, in such esteemed productions as Edward, My Son (1948), That Lady (1949) and Billy Budd (1951). In 1959, he portrayed Captain Keller in the award-winning play The Miracle Worker with Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke. All of these plays were filmed, but Thatcher did not appear in the movie versions. Also a steady fixture on television, he appeared in such made-for-TV films as adaptations of A. J. Cronin's Beyond This Place (1957) and The Citadel (1960),Bonanza(1961), and Brenda Starr (1976). He also played the title role in a Philco Television Playhouse version of Othello and acted in a CBS production of Beyond This Place (1957). Thatcher died of cancer on March 4, 1981, in Thousand Oaks, California, in the Los Angeles area.
Movies24
Movie8.2DramaMysteryAn ailing barrister is thrust back into the courtroom in what becomes one of the most unusual and eventful murder cases of the lawyer's career when he finds himself defending a man being tried for the murder of a socialite.
Witness for the Prosecution
1957 · 1.8K votes
Movie6.8DramaHistoryDrunk and disillusioned Roman, Marcellus Gallio, wins Jesus' robe in a dice game after the crucifixion. Marcellus has never been a man of faith like his slave, Demetrius, but when Demetrius escapes with the robe, Marcellus experiences disturbing visions and feels guilty for his actions. Convinced that destroying the robe will cure him, Marcellus sets out to find Demetrius — and discovers his Christian faith along the way.
The Robe
1953 · 297 votes
Movie7.1AdventureDramaThe Bounty leaves Portsmouth in 1787. Its destination: to sail to Tahiti and load bread-fruit. Captain Bligh will do anything to get there as fast as possible, using any means to keep up a strict discipline. When they arrive at Tahiti, it is like a paradise for the crew, something completely different than the living hell aboard the ship. On the way back to England, officer Fletcher Christian becomes the leader of a mutiny.
Mutiny on the Bounty
1962 · 360 votes
Movie6.3AdventureWarPrince Paris of Troy, shipwrecked on a mission to the king of Sparta, meets and falls for Queen Helen before he knows who she is. Rudely received by the royal Greeks, he must flee...but fate and their mutual passions lead him to take Helen along. This gives the Greeks just the excuse they need for much-desired war.
Helen of Troy
1956 · 64 votes
Movie6.9ActionAdventureWhen the lovely Princess Parisa is shrunken by wicked Sokurah the Magician, Sinbad must embark on a quest to an island of monsters to cure her and prevent a war.
The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
1958 · 330 votes
Movie6.9ThrillerMysteryAircraft factory worker Barry Kane flees across the United States after he is wrongly accused of starting the fire that killed his best friend.
Saboteur
1942 · 562 votes
Movie7.3DramaRomanceIn this Dickens adaptation, orphan Pip discovers through lawyer Mr. Jaggers that a mysterious benefactor wishes to ensure that he becomes a gentleman. Reunited with his childhood patron, Miss Havisham, and his first love, the beautiful but emotionally cold Estella, he discovers that the elderly spinster has gone mad from having been left at the altar as a young woman, and has made her charge into a warped, unfeeling heartbreaker.
Great Expectations
1946 · 389 votes
Movie6.7DramaThrillerKarl Anton Verloc and his wife own a small cinema in a quiet London suburb where they live seemingly happily. But Mrs. Verloc does not know that her husband has a secret that will affect their relationship and threaten her teenage brother's life.
Sabotage
1936 · 380 votes
Movie5.9AdventureRomanceWriter Harry Street reflects on his life as he lies dying from an infection while on safari in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro.
The Snows of Kilimanjaro
1952 · 105 votes
Movie6.1DramaRomanceA widowed doctor of both Chinese and European descent falls in love with a married American correspondent in Hong Kong during China's Communist revolution.
Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing
1955 · 93 votes
Movie6.2AdventureHistoryIn the days of King Henry IV, stalwart young Myles and his sister Meg have been raised as peasants, without any knowledge of who their father really was. But one day, they journey to Macworth Castle. There, Myles falls in love with Lady Anne Macworth, makes friends and enemies, and learns to be a knight.
The Black Shield of Falworth
1954 · 31 votes
Movie6.6AdventureFantasyDesiring control of the kingdom, evil wizard Pendragon devises a cunning machination to usurp the throne. By abducting and forcing Princess Elaine to marry him, Pendragon will coerce the king into abdicating his power. When Pendragon sends a giant to kidnap Elaine, a simple farmer named Jack witnesses the abduction, and bravely slays the beast. Undeterred, Pendragon has more power and creatures at his disposal.
Jack the Giant Killer
1962 · 56 votes
Movie6.4DramaRomanceA free-spirited single mother forms a connection with the wedded headmaster of an Episcopalian boarding school in Monterey, California.
The Sandpiper
1965 · 56 votes
Movie6.5ThrillerRomanceWhen a young writer is falsely accused of murdering a famous actress, he escapes custody and joins forces with the daughter of a police constable to prove his innocence.
Young and Innocent
1937 · 260 votes
Movie6.6DramaRomanceBy the early 1900s, the extraordinary Houdini earned an international reputation for his theatrical tricks and daring feats of extrication from shackles, ropes, handcuffs and... Scotland Yard's jails.
Houdini
1953 · 80 votes
Movie6.4RomanceThrillerA nightclub singer enlists her brother-in-law to track down her husband's killer.
Affair in Trinidad
1952 · 60 votes
Movie7.0AdventureComedyBurt Lancaster plays a pirate with a taste for intrigue and acrobatics who involves himself in the goings on of a revolution in the Caribbean in the late 1700s. A light hearted adventure involving prison breaks, an oddball scientist, sailing ships, naval fights and tons of swordplay.
The Crimson Pirate
1952 · 165 votes
Movie6.3WarActionIn North Africa, German Field Marshal Rommel and his troops have successfully fended off British forces, and now intend to take Tobruk, an important port city. A ramshackle group of Australian reinforcements sent to combat the Germans is put under the command of British Captain MacRoberts. The unruly Aussies immediately clash with MacRoberts, a gruff, strict disciplinarian, however this unorthodox team must band together to protect Tobruk from the German forces.
The Desert Rats
1953 · 101 votes
Movie7.2DramaThrillerCzechoslovakia, March 1939, on the eve of World War II. As the German invaders occupy Prague, inventor Axel Bomasch manages to flee and reach England; but those who need to put his knowledge at the service of the Nazi war machine, in order to carry out their evil plans of destruction, will stop at nothing to capture him.
Night Train to Munich
1940 · 96 votes
Movie6.3RomanceDramaLiving in Kentucky prior to the Civil War, Amantha Starr is a privileged young woman. Her widowed father, a wealthy plantation owner, dotes on her and sends her to the best schools. When he dies suddenly Amantha's world is turned upside down. She learns that her father had been living on borrowed money and that her mother was actually a slave and her father's mistress.
Band of Angels
1957 · 48 votes
Movie5.9AdventureHonest Robert Maynard finds himself serving as ship's surgeon under the infamous pirate Blackbeard.
Blackbeard, the Pirate
1952 · 53 votes
Movie6.3DramaAdventureAbner Hale, a rigid and humorless New England missionary, marries the beautiful Jerusha Bromley and takes her to the exotic island kingdom of Hawaii, intent on converting the natives. But the clash between the two cultures is too great and instead of understanding there comes tragedy.
Hawaii
1966 · 56 votes
Movie5.5DramaHistoryFictionalized account of events leading up the famous nude ride (alas, her hair covers everything) of the militant Saxon lady.
Lady Godiva of Coventry
1955 · 22 votes
Movie7.2DramaThrillerPhillipe, the son of an ambassador in London, hero-worships his father's butler Baines. His perception of the man changes when he accidentally discovers the secret that Baines keeps and witnesses the consequences that adults' lies can cause.
The Fallen Idol
1948 · 200 votes
Series24
TV7.7MysteryDramaThe cases of master criminal defense attorney Perry Mason and his staff who handled the most difficult of cases in the aid of the innocent.
Perry Mason
1957 · 139 votes
TV8.0Sci-Fi & FantasyDramaSpace. The Final Frontier. The U.S.S. Enterprise embarks on a five year mission to explore the galaxy. The Enterprise is under the command of Captain James T. Kirk with First Officer Mr. Spock, from the planet Vulcan. With a determined crew, the Enterprise encounters Klingons, Romulans, time paradoxes, tribbles and genetic supermen led by Khan Noonian Singh. Their mission is to explore strange new worlds, to seek new life and new civilizations, and to boldly go where no man has gone before.
Star Trek
1966 · 1.6K votes
TV7.9CrimeMysteryA continuation of the anthology series “Alfred Hitchcock Presents”, hosted by the master of suspense and featuring thrillers and mysteries.
The Alfred Hitchcock Hour
1962 · 85 votes
TV7.6Action & AdventureCrimeMission: Impossible is an American television series that was created and initially produced by Bruce Geller. It chronicles the missions of a team of secret government agents known as the Impossible Missions Force. In the first season, the team is led by Dan Briggs, played by Steven Hill; Jim Phelps, played by Peter Graves, takes charge for the remaining seasons. A hallmark of the series shows Briggs or Phelps receiving his instructions on a recording that then self-destructs, followed by the theme music composed by Lalo Schifrin. The series aired on the CBS network from September 1966 to March 1973, then returned to television for two seasons on ABC, from 1988 to 1990, retaining only Graves in the cast. It later inspired a popular series of theatrical motion pictures starring Tom Cruise, beginning in 1996.
Mission: Impossible
1966 · 320 votes
TV8.0ComedySci-Fi & FantasyMaxwell Smart, a hilariously inept and maladroit secret agent for CONTROL, battles the nefarious—though equally incompetent—KAOS.
Get Smart
1965 · 448 votes
TV3.8DramaMysteryClimax! is an American anthology series that aired on CBS from 1954 to 1958. The series was hosted by William Lundigan and later co-hosted by Mary Costa. It was one of the few CBS programs of that era to be broadcast in color. Many of the episodes were performed and broadcast live.
Climax!
1954 · 12 votes
TV7.0Action & AdventureWesternDaniel Boone is an American action-adventure television series starring Fess Parker as Daniel Boone that aired from September 24, 1964 to September 10, 1970 on NBC for 165 episodes, and was made by 20th Century Fox Television. Ed Ames co-starred as Mingo, Boone's Cherokee friend, for the first four seasons of the series. Albert Salmi portrayed Boone's companion Yadkin in season one only. Dallas McKennon portrayed innkeeper Cincinnatus. Country Western singer-actor Jimmy Dean was a featured actor as Josh Clements during the 1968–1970 seasons. Actor and former NFL football player Rosey Grier made regular appearances as Gabe Cooper in the 1969 to 1970 season. The show was broadcast "in living color" beginning in fall 1965, the second season, and was shot entirely in California and Kanab, Utah.
Daniel Boone
1964 · 34 votes
- TV5.9DramaComedy
Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre
1963 · 8 votes
TV5.7MysteryDramaAlcoa Presents: One Step Beyond is an American anthology series created by Merwin Gerard. The original series ran for three seasons on ABC from January 1959 to July 1961.
One Step Beyond
1959 · 15 votes
TV7.8MysteryDramaA television anthology series hosted by Alfred Hitchcock featuring dramas, thrillers, and mysteries.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
1955 · 266 votes
TV6.2WesternDramaDick Powell's Zane Grey Theatre, sometimes simply called Zane Grey Theatre, is an American Western anthology series which ran on CBS from 1956 to 1961.
Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theatre
1956 · 10 votes
TV6.6DramaThe Philco Television Playhouse is an American anthology series that was broadcast live on NBC from 1948 to 1955. Produced by Fred Coe, the series was sponsored by Philco. It was one of the most respected dramatic shows of the Golden Age of Television, winning a 1954 Peabody Award and receiving eight Emmy nominations between 1951 and 1956.
The Philco Television Playhouse
1948 · 8 votes
TV6.7WesternAction & AdventureGunsmoke is an American radio and television Western drama series created by director Norman MacDonnell and writer John Meston. The stories take place in and around Dodge City, Kansas, during the settlement of the American West. The central character is lawman Marshal Matt Dillon, played by William Conrad on radio and James Arness on television.
Gunsmoke
1955 · 119 votes
TV7.8Sci-Fi & FantasyMysteryRod Serling narrates an anthology of fantasy, horror and sci-fi stories from a set resembling a macabre museum. A chilling work of art serves as the connective link between the stories.
Night Gallery
1970 · 112 votes
TV7.3Sci-Fi & FantasyComedyThe space family Robinson is sent on a five-year mission to find a new planet to colonise. The voyage is sabotaged time and again by an inept stowaway, Dr. Zachary Smith. The family's spaceship, Jupiter II, also carries a friendly robot who endures an endless stream of abuse from Dr. Smith, but is a trusted companion of young Will Robinson
Lost in Space
1965 · 137 votes
TV6.6CrimeDramaPeter Gunn is an American private eye television series. Filmed in a film noir atmosphere and featuring Henry Mancini music that could tell you the action with your eyes closed, Peter Gunn worked in style. Known as Pete to his friends and simply as Gunn to his enemies, he did his job in a calm cool way.
Peter Gunn
1958 · 26 votes
TV6.1Action & AdventureDramaAdventures in Paradise is an American television series created by James Michener which ran on ABC from 1959 until 1962, starring Gardner McKay as Adam Troy, the captain of the schooner Tiki III, which sailed the South Pacific looking for passengers and adventure. USA Network aired reruns of this series between 1984 and 1988. The plots deal with the romantic and detective stories of Korean War veteran Troy. The supporting cast, varying from season to season, features George Tobias, Guy Stockwell, and Linda Lawson.
Adventures in Paradise
1959 · 7 votes
TV5.8DramaAn anthology series that explored the ways sudden and unexpected wealth changed life for better or for worse. It told the stories of people who were given one million dollars from a benefactor who insisted they never know him, with one exception.
The Millionaire
1955 · 4 votes
TV6.7CrimeThriller is an American anthology television series that aired during the 1960–61 and 1961–62 seasons on NBC. The show featured host Boris Karloff introducing a mix of self-contained, macabre weird-horror and morbid, hitchockian crime stories, in some of which he also starred.
Thriller
1960 · 20 votes
TV6.8Sci-Fi & FantasyAction & AdventureSet fifteen years in the then-future year 1983, the series tells the tale of the crew and passengers of a sub-orbital transport ship named Spindrift. In the pilot episode, the Spindrift is en route from Los Angeles to London, on an ultra-fast sub-orbital flight. Just beyond Earth's boundary with space, the Spindrift encounters a magnetic space storm, and is dragged through a space warp to a mysterious planet where everything is twelve times larger than on Earth, whose inhabitants the Earthlings nickname "the Giants". The Spindrift crash-lands, and the damage renders it inoperable.
Land of the Giants
1968 · 50 votes
TV6.0DramaThe 20th Century Fox Hour is an American drama anthology series televised in the United States on CBS from 1955 to 1957. Some of the shows in this series were restored, remastered and shown on the Fox Movie Channel in 2002 under the title Hour of Stars. The season one episode Overnight Haul, starring Richard Conte and Lizabeth Scott, was released in Australia as a feature film.
The 20th Century Fox Hour
1955 · 10 votes
TV6.5DramaTelephone Time is an American anthology drama series that aired on CBS in 1956, and on ABC from 1957 to 1958. The series features plays by John Nesbitt who hosted the first season. Frank C. Baxter hosted the 1957 and 1958 seasons. The program was directed by Arthur Hiller.
Telephone Time
1956 · 4 votes
TV7.7Action & AdventureSci-Fi & FantasyThe Time Tunnel is a 1966–1967 U.S. color science fiction TV series, written around a theme of time travel adventure. The show was creator-producer Irwin Allen's third science fiction television series, released by 20th Century Fox and broadcast on ABC. The show ran for one season of 30 episodes. Reruns are viewable on cable and by internet streaming. A pilot for a new series was produced in 2002, although it was not picked up.
The Time Tunnel
1966 · 200 votes
TV7.2DramaTony Petrocelli is an Italian-American Harvard-educated lawyer who gave up the big money and frenetic pace of major-metropolitan life to practice in a sleepy city in the American Southwest. He and wife Maggie live in a trailer in the country while waiting for their new house to be built, and travel around in a beat-up old pickup truck. For a quiet rural area, Petrocelli seems to have no trouble running into his share of murderers to defend.
Petrocelli
1974 · 27 votes