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Posted: **Thu May 30, 2024 3:00 pm**

THE COMPLETE CONFESSIONS 1974-1977
Release date: 19 August 2024
Limited Edition Blu-ray (World Blu-ray premieres)

CONFESSIONS OF A WINDOW CLEANER (Val Guest, 1974)
CONFESSIONS OF A POP PERFORMER (Norman Cohen, 1975)
CONFESSIONS OF A DRIVING INSTRUCTOR (Norman Cohen, 1976)
CONFESSIONS FROM A HOLIDAY CAMP (Norman Cohen, 1977)

Pre-order here

Robin Askwith (Britannia Hospital) stars in THE COMPLETE CONFESSIONS, 1974–1977, the definitive collection of the celebrated British sex-comedy series. Based on the pseudonymous Timothy Lea novels by screenwriter Christopher Wood (The Spy Who Loved Me), each instalment follows the fortunes of the feckless and accident-prone – yet seemingly irresistible – Timmy (Askwith) as he gets embroiled in the money-making schemes of his brother-in-law Sidney Noggett (Anthony Booth, Corruption).

The fun starts in Confessions of a Window Cleaner, as Timmy must satisfy the demands of a clientele of lonely housewives whilst attempting to woo police officer Liz (Linda Hayden, The Blood on Satan’s Claw). In Confessions of a Pop Performer, Timmy endures the ups and downs (and ins and outs) of the music business when he joins a band managed by Sid. With Confessions of a Driving Instructor, Timmy finds his female students fumbling for his gearstick. Finally, in Confessions from a Holiday Camp, entertainment officer Timmy struggles to organise a beauty contest under the watchful eye of the camp’s tyrannical new manager.

Directed by Val Guest (The Full Treatment) and Norman Cohen (Stand Up, Virgin Soldiers), this classic quartet features a supporting cast of British comedy greats, including Bill Maynard (Oh No It’s Selwyn Froggitt), Doris Hare (On the Buses), Windsor Davies (Endless Night), John Le Mesurier (The Wrong Box), and Liz Fraser (Adventures of a Taxi Driver). As beloved by audiences as they were reviled by critics, the Confessions series sparked a string of imitators, and stand as a time capsule of the fashions and attitudes of 1970s Britain. Along with an array of new commentaries and interviews, this Blu-ray premiere collection also includes producer Greg Smith’s follow-up feature film, Rosie Dixon – Night Nurse, which was adapted from Christopher Wood’s Confessions of a Night Nurse.

INDICATOR LIMITED EDITION 4 x BLU-RAY BOX SET SPECIAL FEATURES

• High Definition presentations of Confessions of a Window Cleaner, Confessions of a Pop Performer, Confessions of a Driving Instructor, and Confessions from a Holiday Camp;
• Standard Definition presentation of Rosie Dixon – Night Nurse;
• Original mono audio;
• All-new audio commentaries on all four Confessions film by the much-loved star of the series, Robin Askwith (2024);
• Confessions of a Film Composer (2024): interview with prolific film and TV composer Ed Welch, the man responsible for scoring three Confessions movies, and Rosie Dixon – Night Nurse;
• Hey, Judy! (2024): cult film actress Judy Matheson recalls working alongside veteran director Val Guest, and co-star Robin Askwith, during the production of Confessions of a Window Cleaner;
• Interview with David Hamilton (2024): the veteran broadcaster recalls his cameo appearance in Confessions of a Pop Performer;
• Interview with Esta Charkham (2024): the prolific casting director discusses Rosie Dixon – Night Nurse and the unique job of casting a British sex comedy;
• The BEHP Interview with Val Guest (1988): archival audio recording of the Confessions of a Window Cleaner director in conversation with Roy Fowler;
• The BEHP Interview with Geoffrey Foot (1988): archival audio recording of the editor of three Confessions films, and Rosie Dixon – Night Nurse, in conversation with Sidney Cole and Alan Lawson;
• Super 8 version of Confessions of a Driving Instructor: two-part cutdown home-cinema presentation;
• Original theatrical trailers;
• Image galleries: promotional and publicity materials;
• New and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing;
• Limited edition exclusive 120-page book with a new essay by Simon Sheridan, archival interviews and articles, and film credits;
• World premieres on Blu-ray;
• Limited edition box set of 5,000 individually numbered units for the UK;

All extras subject to change

#PHILE360B
BBFC cert: 18
REGION B
EAN: 5060697923841

Posted: **Thu May 30, 2024 7:18 pm**

Do I dare buy this for Rosie Dixon - Night Nurse? I think we know the answer to that!

Pop Performer is the best of this lot but Holiday Camp features an appearance by Colin Crompton of Wheeltappers and Shunters fame.

Posted: **Thu May 30, 2024 8:39 pm**

Are those any better than the "Adventures of" released previously by Indicator ?

Posted: **Fri May 31, 2024 5:35 am**

tenia wrote: Thu May 30, 2024 8:39 pm Are those any better than the "Adventures of" released previously by Indicator ?

Well, 'better' is purely subjective of course. This set does feature roughly 25% more gurning and gratuitous arse-shots from the male lead. And yer obligatory sex scenes sped-up for comic effect, like the Keystone Cops, or that threesome scene in A Clockwork Orange. In fact, Kubrick's film isn't a million miles away from the fantasy 70's aesthetic here, except instead of Alex eventually hurling himself out of a window, Askwith instead falls through the ceiling - possibly onto a hapless vicar - when his rutting gets a bit too rampant.
It's also not too fanciful to suggest that fate could have found McDowell and Askwith swapping roles, if only Kubrick's eye had been drawn slightly further down the cast-list of Lindsay Anderson's If . . Who knows how things may have worked out.

Posted: **Fri May 31, 2024 9:03 am**

Another fascinating what-if concerns what would have happened if Dennis Waterman had been cast, as was mooted (Richard O'Sullivan, Nicky Henson and Richard Beckinsale were also in the frame). The then imminent The Sweeney would probably have still gone ahead, most likely without Waterman - but Minder might well have not got off the ground at all, because Euston Films explicitly conceived it as a post-Sweeney star vehicle designed to boost Waterman's hard-man image.

(That it didn't quite turn out like that is more of a happy accident than anything else, as nobody knew at the time that George Cole's Arthur Daley - originally a supporting character - would turn out to be one of the great Dickensian comic characters of the late 20th century. But he might never have existed at all if it hadn't been for Waterman going for The Sweeney instead of the Confessions cycle.)

As for the falling-through-the-ceiling bit, isn't that from the non-Askwith Rosie Dixon - Night Nurse, the victim being Beryl Reid's sternly no-nonsense Matron? In fact, I don't recall any vicars in the Confessions cycle, except possibly as one of the beauty contest judges at the end of Confessions from a Holiday Camp - but since the Confessions cycle cemented so many British sex-comedy clichés in the public mind it's perhaps not surprising that yet more have been attributed to it.

Posted: **Fri May 31, 2024 11:11 am**

MichaelB wrote: Fri May 31, 2024 9:03 am
As for the falling-through-the-ceiling bit, isn't that from the non-Askwith Rosie Dixon - Night Nurse, the victim being Beryl Reid's sternly no-nonsense Matron? In fact, I don't recall any vicars in the Confessions cycle, except possibly as one of the beauty contest judges at the end of Confessions from a Holiday Camp - but since the Confessions cycle cemented so many British sex-comedy clichés in the public mind it's perhaps not surprising that yet more have been attributed to it.

Yeah, I'm definitely conflating various bits and pieces of 70's Brit-smut there, probably even the odd Viz comic parody. Actually, I notice that The Fat Slag's regular lad-around-town shag, Baz, has been awarded the surname Askwith in more recent years.

Being not yet born when these films were first ejaculated into the nation's flea-pits, I remember initially seeing these (and many other British sex comedies) during the early days of Channel 5, somewhere around the late '90's. They were much appreciated by this teenager who didn't have access to Sky TV or the then fledgling internet thingmajig! Anyway, I'm sure this set will be worth it if only for the commentaries by Askwith, who remains a jovial, very likeable presence. Will he be solo on these, or be joined by a moderator I wonder?

Posted: **Fri May 31, 2024 7:20 pm**

This nicely complements the "Adventures of..." series of films that Indicator gathered together. The "Confessions..." series was more famous though (mostly because these were backed through Columbia Pictures), with Robin Askwith's soapy roll around interlude in a flooding kitchen in one sequence deserving to rank up against Ann-Margaret's similarly sloppy scenes in Tommy! And both of these series (and the tumescent rise of the British sex film in general) helped to deal the death-blow to the naughty but chaster double entendre filled Carry On films, though they did gamely try to compete with awkwardly increasing the explicitness in Carry On Girls, Carry On Behind, Carry On England and most notoriously Carry On Emmanuelle. Which sadly made it even more obvious that their time had passed. Incidentally that's the period of time that this Mitchell and Webb sketch was alluding to!

Apropos of nothing, whilst clearing out my late father's things in the last year, I actually discovered and now have a contemporary novelisation of Confessions of a Night Nurse! Sadly no pictures in it though.

Posted: **Sat Jun 01, 2024 3:00 pm**

colinr0380 wrote: Fri May 31, 2024 7:20 pmIncidentally that's the period of time that this Mitchell and Webb sketch was alluding to!

This is totally tangential, but that's one of my medical-professional wife's all-time favourite sketches, and she's said on numerous occasions that she'd love to work in a 1970s bawdy hospital, since she ticks all the right boxes: splendidly curvaceous figure, keen sense of humour, hair-raisingly filthy mind, you name it. (We're so much on the same comedic wavelength that we'll often be watching a serious news programme, someone will let slip an unfortunate innuendo, and she'll turn to me and go "I can't believe you thought that. You absolutely disgust me.")

But when we showed the sketch to our kids, they thought that it wasn't just totally but bafflingly unfunny, and - like the hapless Askwith in the sketch - they simply couldn't distinguish between cheery innuendo and in-your-face explicitness. They thought that the entire thing was essentially bigging up sexual harassment, and were genuinely horrified - not just by the sketch itself but their parents' approving reaction to it.

And that's because we grew up in the 1970s and they missed out on the entire twentieth century, so they had absolutely no frame of reference.

Posted: **Wed Jun 05, 2024 8:24 pm**

Sadly only Zoe Ball kept the end up in the 1990s.

Posted: **Wed Aug 21, 2024 8:40 am**

Confessions of a Window Beaver.

I loved the way that he's opted for subtitles that look like flagrant innuendo, but which in fact (surprisingly) weren't! Apart from Liz Fraser's line, which definitely was.

Posted: **Thu Sep 19, 2024 7:34 am**

Mondo Digital.

Posted: **Tue Sep 30, 2025 6:47 pm**

Window Cleaner is about to be taken off Tubi so I thought why not get another Val Guest seen. While it’s significantly better than my last Askwith sex comedy, Queen Kong, it still was interesting almost exclusively from an anthropological perspective. For instance while not playing as naive as I suspected, there’s a lot of genuine nudity here including full frontal, it plays off a certain sweetness that the American and especially Canadian counterparts lack. Askwith is basically a Jerry Lewis style comic child that happens to also have a sex drive, preferably with detergent it seems.

Posted: **Tue Sep 30, 2025 9:11 pm**

Casting was absolutely crucial - the appeal of the Timmy Lea character is that he's incredibly gormless and naïve, and so it needed an actor who could get that across while also remaining charming in a way that both sexes found attractive. For all his bed-hopping, he doesn't pose any real threat to anyone, and the women are generally firmly in control.

This is where hiring Val Guest to direct was crucial, because he had several decades' experience, and was writing and shooting comedy with people like Will Hay and Arthur Askey at the turn of the 1940s. Askwith's nickname for him was "Foul Pest" because he was a hard taskmaster on set, but light comedy is one of the hardest genres to bring off convincingly. By the time the far less experienced Norman Cohen took over, the formula was already firmly in place.

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360-363 The Complete Confessions 1974-1977

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