Brigit Forsyth, who has died aged 83, made her name in the BBC sitcom Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? (1973-74) playing Thelma Ferris, the long-suffering and strait-laced wife of Rodney Bewes’s Bob, craving a middle-class world of dinner parties, badminton and fondue evenings; to younger viewers she was Madge in Still Open All Hours (2013-19), keeping a beady eye as her sister Mavis (Maggie Ollerenshaw) is pursued with ever-increasing mayhem by David Jason’s shopkeeper Granville.
10 great British thrillers of the 1970s
As I Start Counting lands on Blu-ray, we run through 10 more edge-of-your-seat gems of British film of the 1970s.
22 April 2021
I Start Counting (1970)
The common conception of British cinema in the 1970s is that it was in terminal decline. Deprived of investment in the face of dwindling box-office returns, producers resorted to peddling period horrors, softcore romps and sitcom spin-offs to stay afloat. Yet, the decade also witnessed a mini thriller boom that exploited the BBFC’s relaxation of censorship to bring a new psychological authenticity and depth to such suspense-filled stories as David Greene’s I Start Counting (1970).